[vi]

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Margaret, and she wanted to cook, so she went into the kitchen and tried and tried, but she could not understand the cookery books, and she made dreadful messes, and spoiled her frocks, and burned her fingers till she cried and cried.

One day she went to her grandmother and her mother and her Pretty Aunt and her Other Aunt, who were all sitting sewing, and asked them to tell her about cooking.

“What is a roux,” she said, “and what’s a mousse and what’s an entrée? What are timbales and sautés and ingredients, and how do you mix them and how long do you bake them? [viii] Won’t somebody please tell me all about it?”

And her Pretty Aunt said, “See the flour all over that new frock!” and her mother said, “Dear child, you are not old enough to cook yet”; and her grandmother said, “Just wait a year or two, and I’ll teach you myself”; and her Other Aunt said, “Some day you shall go to the cookery-school and learn everything; you know little girls can’t cook.”

But Margaret said, “I don’t want to wait till I’m big; I want to cook now; and I don’t want to do cookery-school cooking, but little girl cooking, all by myself.”

So she kept on trying to learn, but she burned her fingers and spoiled her dresses worse than ever, and her messes were so bad they had to be thrown away, every one of them; and she cried and cried. And then one day her grandmother said, “It’s a shame that [ix] child should not learn to cook if she really wants to so much”; and her mother said, “Yes, it is a shame, and she shall learn! Let’s get her a small table and some tins and aprons, and make her a little cookery-book all her own, out of the old ones we wrote for ourselves long ago—just the plain, easy things anybody can make.” And both her aunts said, “Do! We will help, and perhaps we might put in just a few cookery-school things beside.”

It was not long after this that Margaret had a birthday, and she was taken to the kitchen to get her presents, which she thought the funniest thing in the world. There they all were, in the middle of the room: first her father’s present, a little table with a white oil-cloth cover and castors, which would push right under the big table when it was not being used. Over a chair her grandmother’s present, three nice gingham aprons, with sleeves and ruffled [x] bibs. On the little table the presents of the aunties, shiny new tins and saucepans, and cups to measure with, and spoons, and a toasting-fork, and ever so many things; and then on one corner of the table, all by itself, was her mother’s present, her own little cookery-book, with her own name on it, and that was best of all.

When Margaret had looked at everything, she set out in a row the big bowl and the middle-sized bowl and the little wee bowl, and put the scalloped patty-pans round them, and the real egg-beater in front of all, just like a picture, and then she read a page in her cookery-book, and began to believe it was all true. So she danced for joy, and put on a gingham apron and began to cook that very minute, and before another birthday she had cooked every single thing in the book.

This is Margaret’s cookery-book.

[2]

[3]

PORRIDGE

1 quart of boiling water.
4 tablespoonfuls of oatmeal.
1 teaspoonful of salt.

When you are going to make porridge, always begin to cook it the night before. Put a quart of boiling water in the outside of a double saucepan, and another quart in the inside, and in this last mix the salt and oatmeal. Put the saucepan on the back of the kitchen range, where it will hardly cook at all, and let it stand all night. If the fire is to go out, put it on so that it will cook for two hours first. In the morning, if the water in the outside of the saucepan is cold, fill it up with hot, and boil hard for an hour without stirring [4] the mixture. Then turn it out in a hot dish, and send it to the table with a jug of cream.

BOILED RICE

1 cup of rice.
2 cups of boiling water.
1 teaspoonful of salt.

Pick the rice over, taking out all the bits of brown husk; fill the outside of a porridge saucepan with hot water, and put in the rice, salt, and water, and cook for forty minutes, but do not stir it. Then take off the cover from the saucepan, and very gently, without stirring, turn over the rice with a fork; put the dish in the oven without the cover, and let it stand and dry for ten minutes. Then turn it from the saucepan into a hot dish, and put a cover on and serve with cream.

[5]

RICE CROQUETTES

1 cup of milk.
Yolk of 1 egg.
¼ cup of rice.
1 large tablespoonful of powdered sugar.
Small half-teaspoonful of salt.
½ cup of raisins and currants, mixed.
½ teaspoonful of vanilla.

Wash the rice and put it in a double saucepan with the milk, salt, and sugar and cook till very thick; beat the yolks of the eggs and stir into the rice, and beat till smooth. Sprinkle the washed raisins and currants with flour, and roll them in it and mix these in, and last the vanilla. Turn out on a plate, and let all get very cold. Then make into pyramids, dip in the yolk of an egg mixed with a tablespoonful of water, and then into sifted bread-crumbs, and fry in a deep saucepan of boiling [6] fat, using a wire basket. As you take these from the fat, put them on paper in the oven with the door open. When all are done, put them on a hot plate and sift powdered sugar over them, and put a bit of red jelly on top of each. This is also a nice sweet for luncheon.

EGGS

TO BOIL EGGS

When the water boils, allow three and a half minutes for a lightly boiled egg, four minutes for better done, and five minutes for hard-boiled.

POACHED EGGS

Take a pan which is not more than three inches deep, and put in as many muffin-rings as you wish to cook eggs. Pour in boiling water till the rings are half covered, and scatter half a teaspoonful [7] of salt in the water. Let it boil up once, and then draw the pan to the edge of the stove, where the water will not boil again. Take a cup, break one egg in it, and gently slide this into a ring, and so on till all are full. While they are cooking, take some toast and cut it into round pieces with the biscuit-cutter, then butter them. When the eggs have cooked ten minutes, take a slice and slip it under one egg with its ring, and lift the two together on to a piece of toast, and then take off the ring; and so on with all the eggs. Shake a very little salt and pepper over the dish, and put parsley round the edge. Sometimes a little chopped parsley is nice to put over the eggs, too.

POACHED EGGS WITH WHITE SAUCE

Poach what number of eggs you require. Place on rounds of buttered [8] toast. Have ready a nice creamy sauce as follows:

1 tablespoonful of butter; when melted put in 1 oz. of flour. Mix both together, add enough milk to the thickness you require, stirring it all the time. A little cream added greatly improves it; serve with chopped ham, tongue, or parsley sprinkled over the eggs.

SCRAMBLED EGGS

4 eggs.
2 tablespoonfuls of milk.
½ teaspoonful of salt.

Put the eggs in a bowl and stir till they are well mixed; add the milk and salt. Make the frying-pan very hot, and put 1 oz. of butter in it; when it melts, stir it well from side to side, till the bottom of the pan is covered. Put in the eggs, and stir them, scraping them off the bottom of the pan until [9] they begin to get a little firm; then draw the pan to the edge of the stove, and scrape up from the bottom all the time till the whole looks alike, creamy and firm, but not hard. Put them in a hot, covered dish.

SCRAMBLED EGGS WITH PARSLEY

Chop enough parsley to make a teaspoonful, and mince half as much onion. Put the onion in the butter when you heat the pan, and cook the eggs in it; when you are nearly ready to take the eggs off the fire, put in the parsley.

After Margaret had learned how to make these perfectly, she began to mix other things with the eggs.

SCRAMBLED EGGS WITH TOMATO

When Margaret had a few tomatoes she would take them, add a half-teaspoonful [10] of salt, two shakes of pepper, and a teaspoonful of chopped parsley, and simmer it all on the fire for five minutes; then she would cook half a teaspoonful of minced onion in the butter in the hot frying-pan as before, and turn in the eggs, and when they were beginning to grow firm put in the tomato. This made a very nice breakfast dish.

SCRAMBLED EGGS WITH CHICKEN

Chop fine a cup of cold chicken, or any light-coloured meat, such as veal, and heat it with a tablespoonful of water, a half-teaspoonful of salt, two shakes of pepper, and a teaspoonful of chopped parsley. Cook a half-teaspoonful of minced onion in the butter you put in the hot frying-pan, and turn in the eggs, and when they set, mix in the chicken.

[11] Sometimes Margaret used tomato, as in the previous recipe, and the chicken in the eggs, when she wanted to make a large dish.

EGGS BALDWIN

Boil 5 or 6 eggs hard. Put them into cold water, then shell them, make a white sauce the same as already described on page 8, with pepper and salt to taste. Remove the yolk from the whites, cut up the whites in slices, and put into the sauce to boil up for a minute. Pass the yolks through a wire sieve, put the sauce and egg mixture into a dish, and decorate the top with the yolk and some chopped parsley.

CREAMED EGGS IN BAKING-DISHES

Cut six hard-boiled eggs into bits, mix with a cup of white sauce, and put [12] in small baking-dishes which you have buttered. Cover over with fine, sifted bread-crumbs, and dot with bits of butter, about four to each dish, and brown in the oven. Stick a bit of parsley in the top of each, and put each dish on a plate, to serve.

BIRDS’ NESTS

Sometimes, when she wanted something very pretty for breakfast, Margaret used this recipe:

Break six eggs, putting the whites together in one large bowl, and the yolks into six cups on the kitchen table. Beat the whites till they are stiff, putting in half a teaspoonful of salt afterwards. Divide the whites, putting them into six patty-pans, or small baking-dishes. Make a little hole or nest in the middle of each, and slip one yolk carefully from the cup into the place. Sprinkle a little [13] salt and pepper over them, and put a bit of butter on top, and put the dishes into a pan and set in the oven till the egg-whites are a little brown.

OMELETTE

Making an omelette seems rather a difficult thing for a little girl, but Margaret made hers in a very easy way. Her recipe said:

Break four eggs separately. Beat the whites till they are stiff, and then wash and wipe dry the egg-beater, and beat the yolks till they foam, and then put in half a teaspoonful of salt. Pour the yolks over the whites, and mix gently with a large spoon. Have a frying-pan hot, with a piece of butter melted in it, and spread the butter over the whole surface; pour the eggs on and let them cook for a moment. Then [14] take a kitchen palette-knife and slip under an edge, and look to see if the middle is getting brown, because the colour comes there first. When it is a nice even colour, slip the knife well under, and turn the omelette half over, covering one part with the other, and then slip the whole off on to a hot plate.

The cook had to show Margaret how to manage this the first time, but after that she could do it alone.

OMELETTE WITH MUSHROOMS

Take a few mushrooms or a bottle of champignons , and slice half of them into thin pieces. Make a cup of very rich white sauce, using cream instead of milk, and cook the mushrooms in it for one minute. Make the omelette as before, and cover with the sauce when you turn it over.

[15]

EGGS IN CASES

Butter some ramekin cases (china or paper) and put a small piece of butter and a pinch of chopped parsley, pepper and salt, and break an egg carefully into each case; add a tablespoonful of cream and a few browned bread-crumbs. Bake about five minutes.

EGGS WITH CHEESE

6 eggs.
2 full tablespoonfuls Parmesan cheese.
½ teaspoonful salt.
Pinch of red pepper.

Beat the eggs without separating till light and foamy, and then add the cheese, salt, and pepper. Put a tablespoonful of butter in the frying-pan, and when it is hot put in the eggs, and stir till smooth and firm. Serve on small pieces of buttered toast.

Parmesan cheese is very nice to use [16] in cooking; it comes in bottles, all ready grated to use.

FRIED EGGS AND BACON

Take some bacon and put in a hot frying-pan, and cook till it crisps. Then lift it out on a hot dish and put in the oven. Break six eggs in separate cups, and slide them carefully into the fat left in the pan, and let them cook till they are rather firm and the bottom is brown. Then take a strainer and take them out carefully, and put in the middle of the dish, and arrange the bacon all around, with parsley on the edge.

HAM AND EGGS, MOULDED

Take small, deep tins, such as are used for timbales, and butter them. Make one cup of white sauce; take a cup of cold boiled ham which has been [17] put through the mincing-machine, and mix with a tablespoonful of white sauce and one egg, slightly beaten. Press this like a lining into the tins, and then gently drop a raw egg in the centre of each. Stand them in a pan of boiling water in the oven till the eggs are firm—about ten minutes—and turn out on a round dish. Put round them the rest of the white sauce. You can stand the little moulds on circles of toast if you wish.

This recipe was given Margaret by her Pretty Aunt, who got it at the cookery-school; it sounded harder than it really was, and after trying it once Margaret often used it.

SCOTCH EGGS

3 hard-boiled eggs.
½ lb. of sausages.
1 raw egg.
Bread-crumbs.

[18] Shell the eggs and put them in cold water for a few minutes, then take out and dry them. Roll them out in flour, then coat each over with sausage meat, keeping the shape. Next break an egg on a plate, brush the eggs over with the raw egg and roll them in bread-crumbs, and fry in the hot fat till a golden brown. To be served on fried bread.

DEVILLED EGGS

Fry four eggs lightly, then trim them neatly with a round cutter and dish them up. Pour over them the following, put together in a stewpan: 1 oz. of butter, 1 tablespoonful cream, 1 teaspoonful of mustard, 1 teaspoonful of flour, 1 tablespoonful chutney, 1 teaspoonful Worcester sauce, 4 tablespoonfuls stock. Stir till it comes thick, and pour over the eggs.

[19]

FISH

One day some little fish came home from market, and Margaret felt sure they must be meant for her to cook. They were called smelts, and, on looking, she found a recipe for cooking them, just as she had expected.

FRIED SMELTS

Put a deep kettle on the fire, with two cups of lard in it, to get very hot. Wipe each smelt inside and out with a clean wet cloth, and then with a dry one. Have a saucer of flour mixed with a teaspoonful of salt, and another saucer of milk. Put the tail of each smelt through its gills—that is, the opening near its mouth. Then roll the smelts first in milk and then in flour, and shake off any lumps. Throw a bit of bread into the fat in the kettle, and see if it [20] turns brown quickly; it does if the fat is hot enough, but if not you must wait. Put four smelts in the wire basket, and stand it in the fat, so that the fish are entirely covered, for only half a minute, or till you can count thirty. As you take them out of the kettle, lay them on heavy brown paper in a pan in the oven, to drain and keep hot, and leave the door open till all are done. Lay a folded napkin on a long, narrow dish, and arrange the fishes in a row, with slices of lemon and parsley on the sides.

FISH CAKES

2 eggs, bread-crumbs, and cold fish.

They are made from any cold fish, by making a nice white sauce, very thick. Take all the fish from the bones and mash up with salt and pepper, then put it into the sauce. Stir all up together, [21] turn out in a dish, and let it get quite cold and hard.

Have ready your boiling fat; roll the fish mixture in your hands the shape you want the cakes; beat up 2 eggs and brush them over with the eggs and place in the bread-crumbs. This must be done twice, as then the fish cakes will not burst. Cook for five minutes.

SCALLOPED FISH

The fish is done just as the fish cakes are, in sauce, but it is turned out into a dish or pie-dish, which must be buttered, and a layer of bread-crumbs sprinkled over, with bits of butter put on the top. Place in an oven till it browns on the top.

PICKLED HERRINGS OR MACKEREL

Split open four or five herrings. Wash them and remove the back-bone. Roll [22] up from the head end, with their roes inside. Place in a dish, cover them with vinegar, two bay-leaves, and a few peppercorns and a few slices of onions; put in the oven with a plate over the dish and cook till the onion is done; turn them out in any dish and pour the liquor over them.

DRIED HADDOCK

Place your haddock in a baking-tin and cover it with half milk and half water. If there is no milk use only water. Put a plate or dish over the top and put in the oven until it is done. Do not boil it over the fire, as you lose half the flavour.

SCOTCH DRIED HADDOCK

Hold the haddock in front of the fire till it is warm, then remove the skin at [23] the back, beginning at the tail. Put it into a grill and let it cook in front of the fire for five or six minutes. Put butter and pepper; serve very hot.

FRIED PLAICE OR SOLE

Have the plaice filleted. Wash and dry it, then brush it over with raw eggs and place it in bread-crumbs. Have your frying fat boiling and put the plaice in to cook for five minutes. Take out and put on kitchen paper to drain the fat off. Serve on hot dish, with fish paper under, and decorate with parsley.

FILLETS OF SOLES WITH WHITE WINE SAUCE

Boil the fillets of soles till done, then make the white sauce. Add a sherry glass of wine, then put the fillets into [24] the sauce. Allow them to simmer two or three minutes, then add the yolk of an egg to the sauce and serve.

HOW TO GRILL ANY FISH FOR BREAKFAST

Split them open. Wash and dry any fish, such as herrings, mackerel, fresh haddock; kippers are also done this way. Place in the grill and do in front of the fire; put butter and pepper on to taste. They will take about ten minutes.

HOW TO BOIL FISH

Rub the skin of the fish with lemon and put salt in water. Wash the fish first and place it in the fish-kettle with enough water to well cover it. Let it come up to the boil and afterwards let it gently simmer until cooked.

[25]

FRIED BACON

Margaret’s mother believed there was only one very nice way to cook bacon. It was like this: Slice the bacon very, very thin, and cut off the rind. Put the slices in a hot frying-pan for about three minutes. When both sides are cooked, lay it on a hot dish.

GRILLED CHOPS

Rub the grill with some of the fat, so that the chops will not stick. Lay in the chops and put over a clear, red fire without flame, and toast one side first and then the other; do this till they are brown. Lay on a hot dish, and dust both sides with salt and a tiny bit of pepper. Put bits of lemon and parsley round, and send to the table very hot.

[26]

FRIED CHOPS

If the fire is not clear, so that you cannot grill the chops, you must fry them. Take a frying-pan and make it very hot indeed; then lay in the chops and cook one side very quickly, and then the other, and after that let them cook more slowly. When they are done—you can tell by picking open a little place in one with a fork and looking in the inside—put them on a dish as before, with pepper and salt. If they are at all greasy, put on kitchen paper in the oven first, to drain, leaving the door of the oven open. Be careful not to let them get cold.

LIVER AND BACON

Buy half a pound of calf’s liver and half a pound of bacon. Cut the liver in thin slices and pour boiling water over [27] it, and then wipe each slice dry. Slice the bacon very thin and cut off the rind; put this in a hot frying-pan and cook very quickly, turning it once or twice. Just as soon as it is brown take it out and lay it on a dish. Take a saucer of flour and mix in it a teaspoonful of salt and a very little pepper; dip the slices of liver in this, one at a time, and shake them free of lumps. Lay them in the hot fat of the bacon in the pan and fry till brown. Put on a hot dish, and then put one slice of bacon on each slice of liver. Put parsley all round, and sometimes use slices of lemon, too, for a change.

BACHELOR BREAKFAST

Two slices of bacon fried. Place on them a fried egg and on the top a cooked tomato which has been fried in a little butter.

[28]

GRILLED STEAK

See that the fire is clear and red, without flames. Trim off most of the fat from the steak, and rub the wires of the grill with it and heat it over the coals. Then put in the meat and turn over and over as it cooks, and be careful not to let it get burnt. When brown, put it on a hot dish, dust over with salt and a very little pepper, and dot it with tiny lumps of butter. Put parsley round. Steak ought to be pink inside; not brown and not red. Put a fork in as you did with the chops, and twist in a little, and you can see when it gets the right colour.

VEAL CUTLET

Dust the meat over with salt, pepper, and flour. Put a tablespoonful of dripping in a hot frying-pan, and let it heat till it smokes a little. Lay the [29] meat in and turn it over twice as it cooks, until it is brown, for veal cutlets must not be eaten red or pink inside. Put in a hot oven and cover it up while you make the gravy, by putting one tablespoonful of flour into the hot fat in the pan, stirring it till it is brown. Then put in a cup of boiling water, half a teaspoonful of salt, and a very little pepper; put this through the strainer, pressing it with a spoon, and pour over the meat. Put parsley round the cutlet, and send hot to the table.

Margaret’s father said he could not possibly manage without potatoes for breakfast, so sometimes Margaret made something nice out of the cold potatoes she found in the larder.

CREAMED POTATOES

Cut cold boiled potatoes into pieces as large as the end of your finger; put [30] them into a pan on the back of the stove, with enough milk to cover them, and let them stand till they have drunk up all the milk; perhaps they will slowly cook a little as they do this, but that will do no harm. In another saucepan, or in the frying-pan, put a tablespoonful of butter, and when it bubbles put in a tablespoonful of flour, and stir till they melt together; then put in two cups of hot milk, and stir till it is all smooth. Put in one teaspoonful of salt, and lastly the potatoes, but stir them only once while they cook, for fear of breaking them. Add one teaspoonful of chopped parsley, and put them in a hot covered dish. You can make another sort of potatoes when you have finished creaming them in this way, by putting a layer of them in a deep buttered baking-pan, with a layer of white sauce over the top, and bread-crumbs and bits of butter for a crust. [31] Brown well in a hot oven. When you do this, remember to make the sauce with three cups of milk and two tablespoonfuls of flour and two of butter, and then you will have enough for everything.

HASHED BROWNED POTATOES

Chop four cold potatoes fine, and add one teaspoonful of salt and a very little pepper. Put a tablespoonful of butter in the frying-pan, and turn it so that it runs all over; when it bubbles put in the potatoes, and smooth them evenly over the pan. Cook till they are brown and crusty on the bottom; then put in a teaspoonful of chopped parsley, and fold over like an omelette.

CHIPPED POTATOES

Wash and peel four potatoes and cut them into thin pieces. Heat two cups [32] of lard very hot, till when you drop in a bit of bread it browns at once. Wipe the potatoes dry and drop in a handful. Have a slice ready, and as soon as they brown take them out and lay on brown paper in the oven, and put in another handful.

POTATO CAKES

Take two cups of mashed potato, and mix well with the beaten yolk of one egg, and make into small flat cakes; dip each into flour. Heat two tablespoonfuls of nice dripping, and when it is hot lay in the cakes and brown, turning each with the slice as it gets crusty on the bottom.

TO KEEP FRYING FAT

The fat can be used to fry in a great many times if strained after using, and put in a clean jar.

[33]

How to know when fat is boiling: Drop a few bread-crumbs in the fat. They should turn brown at once.

BUTTERED TOAST

Toast is very difficult for grown-up people to make, because they have made it wrong all their lives, but it is easy for little girls to learn to make, because they can make it right from the first.

Cut bread that is at least two days old into slices a third of an inch thick. Be sure the fire is red, without any flames. Take the toasting-fork and move the slices of bread backwards and forwards across the coals, but do not let them brown; do both sides this way, and then brown first one and then the other afterward. Trim off [34] the edges, butter a little quickly, and send to the table hot.

BAKING-POWDER BISCUIT

Margaret’s Other Aunt said little girls could never, never make biscuits, but this little girl really did, in this way:

1 pint of sifted flour.
½ teaspoonful of salt.
4 teaspoonfuls of baking-powder.
¾ cup of milk.
1 tablespoonful of butter.

Put the salt and baking-powder in the flour and sift well, and then rub the butter in with a spoon. Little by little put in the milk, mixing all the time, and then lift out the dough on a floured board and roll it out lightly, just once, till it is one inch thick. Flour your hands and mould the little balls as [35] quickly as you can, and put them close together in a shallow pan that has had a little flour shaken over the bottom, and bake in a hot oven about twenty minutes, or till the biscuits are brown. If you handle the dough much, the biscuits will be tough, so you must work fast.

MUFFINS

2 cups of sifted flour.
2 teaspoonfuls of baking-powder.
½ teaspoonful of salt.
1 cup of milk.
2 eggs.
1 large teaspoonful of melted butter.

Mix the flour, salt, and baking-powder, and sift. Beat the yolks of the eggs, put in the butter with them and the milk, then the flour, and last the stiff whites of the eggs. Have the muffin-tins hot, pour in the batter, and [36] bake fifteen or twenty minutes. These must be eaten at once, or they will fall.

There was one little recipe in Margaret’s book which she thought must be meant for the smallest girl who ever tried to cook, it was so easy. But the little biscuits were good enough for grown people to like. This was it:

CREAM CRACKERS

Quarter-pound of flour, yolks of two eggs; beat them well with a quarter of a pint of cream and pinch of salt. Stir into the flour, roll out very thin, cut into any shape with a knife, prick with a fork, and bake a few at a time in a good oven. They must be straw colour. In a good oven they should take five minutes. Put on a sieve till cold.

[37]

GRIDDLE-CAKES

2 eggs.
1 cup of milk.
1½cups of flour.
2 teaspoonfuls of baking-powder.
½ teaspoonful of salt.

Put the eggs in a bowl without separating them, and beat them with a spoon till light. Put in the milk, then the flour mixed with the salt, and last the baking-powder all alone. Bake on a hot, buttered griddle. This recipe makes delicious cakes, especially if eaten with sugar and thick cream.

Last of all the things Margaret learned to make for breakfast came coffee, and this she could make in two ways; sometimes she made it this first way, and sometimes the other, which is called French coffee.

[38]

COFFEE

First be sure your coffee-pot is shining clean; look in the spout and in all the cracks, and wipe them out carefully, for you cannot make good coffee except in a perfectly clean pot. Then get three heaped tablespoonfuls of ground coffee, and mix in one tablespoonful of cold water. Pour in one quart of boiling water, and let it boil up once. Then stir down the grounds which come to the top, put in two tablespoonfuls of cold water, and let it stand for a minute on the back of the stove, and then strain it into the silver pot for the table. This pot must be made very hot, by filling it with boiling water and letting it stand on the kitchen table while the coffee is boiling. If this recipe makes the coffee stronger than the family like it, take less coffee, and if it is not strong enough, take more coffee.

[39]

FRENCH COFFEE

Get one of the pots which are made so that the coffee will drip through; put three tablespoonfuls of very finely powdered coffee in this, and pour in a quart of boiling water. When it has all dripped through, it is ready to put in the hot silver pot.

[40]

[42]

[43]

So many things in this part of Margaret’s book called for white sauce, or cream sauce, that the recipe for that came first of all.

WHITE OR CREAM SAUCE

1 tablespoonful of butter.
1 tablespoonful of flour.
1 cup hot milk or cream.
⅓ teaspoonful of salt.

Melt the butter, and when it bubbles put in the flour, shaking the saucepan as you do so, and rub till smooth. Put in the hot milk, a little at a time, and stir and cook without boiling till all is smooth and free from lumps. Add the salt, and, if you choose, a little pepper.

[44] Cream sauce is made exactly as is white sauce, but cream is used in place of milk. What is called thick white sauce is made by taking two tablespoonfuls of butter and two of flour, and only one cup of milk.

CREAMED OYSTERS

1 pint of oysters.
1 large cup of cream sauce.

Make the sauce of cream if you have it, and if not use a very heaping tablespoonful of butter in the white sauce. Keep this hot.

Drain off the oyster juice and wash the oysters by holding them under the cold-water tap. Strain the juice and put the oysters back in it, and put them on the fire and let them just simmer till the edges of the oysters curl; then drain them from the juice again and drop them in the sauce, and add a little more [45] salt (celery-salt is nice to use if you have it), and just a tiny bit of cayenne pepper. You can serve the oysters on squares of buttered toast, or put them in a large dish, with sifted bread-crumbs over the top and tiny bits of butter, and brown in the oven. Or you can put them in small dishes as they are, and put a sprig of parsley in each dish.

PANNED OYSTERS

Take the oysters from their juice, strain it, wash the oysters, and put them back in it. Put them in a saucepan with a little salt—about half a teaspoonful to a pint of oysters—and a little pepper, and a piece of butter as large as the end of your thumb. Let them simmer till the edges curl, just as before, and put them on squares of hot buttered toast.

[46]

PIGS IN BLANKETS

These were great fun to make, and Margaret often begged to get them ready for company.

15 large oysters.
15 very thin slices of bacon.

Sprinkle each oyster with a very little salt and pepper. Trim the rind from the bacon and wrap each oyster in one slice, pinning this “blanket” tightly on the back with a tiny Japanese wooden toothpick. Have ready a hot frying-pan, and lay in five oysters, and cook till the bacon is brown and the edges of the oysters curl, turning each over once. Put these on a hot plate in the oven with the door open, and cook five more, and so on. Put them on a long, narrow dish, with slices of lemon and sprigs of parsley round. Or you can put each one on a strip of toast which you have dipped in the gravy in [47] the pan; this is the better way. This dish must be eaten very hot, or it will not be good.

CREAMED FISH

2 cups of cold fish.
1 cup of white sauce.

Pick any cold fish left from dinner into even bits, taking out all the bones and skin, and mix with the hot white sauce. Stir until smooth, and add a small half-teaspoonful of salt, two shakes of pepper, and sometimes a half-teaspoonful of chopped parsley.

You can put this in a buttered baking-dish and cover the top with crumbs and bits of butter, and brown in the oven, or you can put it in small dishes and brown also, or you can serve it just as it is, in little dishes.

[48]

CREAMED LOBSTER

1 lobster, or the meat from 1 tin.
1 large cup of white or cream sauce.

Take the lobster out of the shell and clean it; the cook will have to show you how the first time. Or, if you are using tinned lobster, pour away all the juice and pick out the bits of shell, and find the black string which is apt to be there, and throw it away. Cut the meat in pieces as large as the end of your finger, and heat it in the sauce till it steams. Put in a small half-teaspoonful of salt, a pinch of cayenne, and a squeeze of lemon. Do not put this in a large dish, but in small ones, buttered well, and serve at once. Stand a little claw up in each dish.

DRESSED CRAB

Crack all the claws of the crab, and pick out all the fish into a basin. Take [49] all the yellow part out of the body of the crab and mix it with the other. Mix together one teaspoonful of mustard in a quarter-pint of salad oil, one tablespoonful of vinegar, and two tablespoonfuls of cream; salt and pepper to taste. Scrape and wash the body shell of the crab, then put in the crab which has been mixed in the sauce; pile it up, put it on a dish, and serve with parsley round it.

HOT CRAB

Buy a very nice, fresh crab. A very delicious dish is made by mixing a cup of rich cream sauce with the crab meat, seasoning it well with salt and pepper, and putting in the crab-shells; cover with crumbs, dot with butter, and brown in the oven. This is a nice thing to have for luncheon when there are visitors.

[50]

CREAMED CHICKEN OR TURKEY

2 cups of cold chicken.
1 large cup of white or creamed sauce.
½ teaspoonful of chopped parsley.
Salt and pepper.

Pick the chicken or turkey off the bones and cut into small bits before you measure it. Heat it in the sauce till very hot, but do not let it boil, and add the seasoning: about half a teaspoonful of salt, and a tiny bit of cayenne, or as much celery-salt in the place of the common kind. Put in a large buttered dish and serve, or in small dishes, either with crumbs on top or not.

SCALLOPED EGGS

6 hard-boiled eggs.
1 cup cream or white sauce.
1 cup fine bread-crumbs.
Salt and pepper.

[51] Cook the eggs twenty minutes, and while they are cooking make the white sauce, and butter one large or six small dishes. Peel the eggs and cut them into bits as large as the end of your finger. Put a layer of bread-crumbs on the bottom of the dish; then a layer of egg; then a sprinkling of salt, pepper, and bits of butter; then a layer of white sauce. Then more crumbs, egg, and seasoning, till the dish is full, with crumbs on top. Put bits of butter over all, and brown in the oven.

EGGS IN DOUBLE CREAM

This is a recipe Margaret’s Pretty Aunt got in Paris, and it is a very nice one. Have half a pint of very thick cream—the kind you use to whip; the French call this double cream. Cook six eggs hard and cut them into bits. Butter a baking-dish, or small dishes, [52] and put in a layer of egg, then a layer of cream, then a sprinkling of salt, and one of paprika, which is sweet red pepper. Put one thin layer of fine, sifted crumbs on top with butter, and brown in the oven. Or you can put the eggs and cream together and heat them, and serve on thin pieces of buttered toast, with one extra egg put through the sieve over the whole.

CREAMED EGGS ON TOAST

Make small pieces of nice toast and dip each one in white sauce. Boil hard four eggs, and cut in even slices and cover the toast, and then spread the rest of the white sauce over all in a thin layer.

EGGS IN BEDS

Chop a cupful of nice cold meat, and season with a little salt, pepper, and [53] chopped parsley. Add enough stock or hot water just to wet it, and cook till rather dry. Put this in buttered baking-dishes, filling each half-full, and on top of each gently slip from a cup one egg. Sprinkle over with salt and pepper, and put in the oven till firm.

COTTAGE PIE

This was a dish Margaret used to make on washing-day and house-cleaning-day, and such times when everybody was busy and no one wanted to stop and go to market to buy anything for luncheon.

Put one ounce of butter into a saucepan, and when melted add a tablespoonful of flour, and when mixed add half a pint of stock and colour it with gravy browning. Have ready any cold meat which has been minced. Flavour it with salt, pepper, a teaspoonful of [54] Worcester sauce, and a little chopped parsley and onion if liked. Put it all into the sauce and stir it well round. If too thick, add a little more stock. Turn it out into a pie-dish and cover it over with very soft-mashed potatoes, and put in the oven to brown.

MINCED CHICKEN

1 cup of cold chicken, cut in small, even pieces.
½ cup of chicken stock.
1 teaspoonful of chopped parsley.
½ teaspoonful of salt.
A pinch of pepper.
1 oz. of butter.

Put the chicken stock—which is the water the chicken was cooked in—or good stock into the saucepan, and mix in the chicken and seasoning, and cook and stir till it is rather dry. Serve as it is, or on squares of buttered toast. [55] You can make any cold meat into hash in this way, having it different every time. Sometimes you can put in the chopped onion, or a cup of hot peas.

SARDINES ON TOAST

Split the sardines, take out back-bone, and remove all skin; put on each a little butter and pepper. Dish on squares of buttered toast, and serve very hot.

CHEESE FONDU

This was a recipe her Aunt put in Margaret’s book out of the one she had made at the cookery-school.

1 cup of fresh bread-crumbs.
2 cups of grated cheese.
1 cup of milk.
1 bit of soda as large as a pea.
½ teaspoonful of salt. [56]
1 pinch of red pepper.
1 teaspoonful of butter.
2 eggs.

Put the butter in a saucepan to heat while you beat the eggs light, without separating them; let these stand while you stir everything else into the pan, beginning with the milk. Cook this five minutes, stirring all the time, and then put in the eggs and cook three minutes more. Put six pieces of toast on a hot plate, and pour the whole over them, and send at once to the table to be eaten very hot.

WELSH RAREBIT

Cut one or two slices of bread half-inch thick, and toast it on both sides and well butter it. Take half-pound of good Cheddar cheese, cut it up in very thin slices, and put in a stewpan, with [57] two tablespoonfuls of thick cream, a teaspoonful of mixed mustard, and a little pepper. Stir all these over the fire till the mixture is like cream; cut the toast in square pieces and place on a hot dish, and pour the cheese mixture all over them, and brown quickly with a red-hot salamander.

PLAIN DRESSED LOBSTER

Lay the lobster out flat, with the back up. Get a knife into the middle of the head and cut right down the middle of the lobster. Break the claws from the body and crack the shell, also cut the body away from the head. Stick the head up in the middle of the dish; place the two halves of the body round it, and the claws each side. Decorate with parsley. Vinegar must be handed with it.

[58]

VEAL LOAF

1½ lbs. of veal and
2 strips of bacon, chopped together.
½ cup of bread-crumbs.
1 beaten egg.
½ teaspoonful of grated nutmeg.
½ teaspoonful of black pepper.
1½ teaspoonfuls of salt.

Bake three hours.

Chop the meat all together; then put everything in a dish and stir in the egg, beaten without separating, and mix very well. Press it into a bread-pan and put in the oven for three hours by the clock.

Every half-hour pour over it a tablespoonful hot water and butter mixed. You can put a tablespoonful of butter into a cup of water, and keep it on the back of the stove ready all the time. After the meat has baked two hours, put a piece of heavy brown paper over the [59] top, and keep it there till the meat is done, or it may get too brown. This is to slice cold; it is very nice for a picnic.

PRESSED CHICKEN

This was one of the things Margaret liked to make for Sunday-night supper. Have a good-sized chicken cut up. Put it in a saucepan and cover with cold water, and cook very slowly and gently, till the meat falls off the bones. When it begins to grow tender, put in a half-teaspoonful of salt. Take it out, and cut it up in nice, even pieces, and put all the bones back into the saucepan, and let them cook till there is only about a pint and half of broth. Add a little more salt, and a sprinkling of pepper, and strain this through a jelly bag. Mix it with the chicken, and put them both into a mould, and when cold put it on [60] ice over night. After it has stood for an hour, put a weight on it, to make it firm. Slice with a very sharp knife, and put on a dish with parsley all round. This is a nice luncheon dish for a summer day, as well as a supper dish.

When you have bits of cold meat which you cannot slice, and yet which you wish to serve in some nice way, make this recipe, which sounds difficult, but is really easy and very nice:

MEAT SOUFFLÉ

1 cup of white sauce.
1 cup of chopped meat.
2 eggs.
Teaspoonful of chopped parsley.
Half a teaspoonful of minced onion.

Put the parsley and onion in the meat, and mix with the white sauce. [61] Beat the yolks of the eggs and stir in, and cook one minute, and then cool. Beat the whites of the eggs and fold in, and bake half an hour, or a little more in a deep, buttered baking-dish. You must serve this immediately, or it will fall.

LUNCH ROLL

Half a pound of beefsteak, all lean; half a pound of cooked ham, quite lean; both to be passed through the mincing-machine; half a pound of bread-crumbs, two sprigs of mace, half a nutmeg, pepper and salt to taste; two eggs, the yolks and whites well beaten; two hard-boiled eggs.

Mix all together and make in the shape of a sausage. Tie very tightly in a cloth and boil for two hours.

Glaze it and serve cold. The ham usually makes it salt enough, and cayenne is a great improvement.

[62]

HASH

Remove all fat and sinews from the meat, and cut it into neat pieces and leave these to marinate. [A] Take a wineglassful of stock, half a wineglassful of white wine, a dessertspoonful of lemon juice or vinegar, a teaspoonful of Harvey’s or Worcester sauce, a teaspoonful of finely chopped parsley, and a finely chopped onion. Leave the meat in this for two or three hours, then make the following sauce:

For each half-pound of meat used, peel and mince a small onion, and a mushroom if at hand, and fry these lightly in half an ounce of butter or dripping. Next sprinkle in half an ounce of flour. Then gradually add half-pint of stock, using the marinate also. Allow to cool a little. Lay in the meat and let it stand by the fire until quite hot, but not to boil.

[63]

Some of the things Margaret made for breakfast she made for lunch or supper, too, such as scalloped eggs and omelettes. She had some vegetables besides, such as—

BAKED TOMATOES

6 large tomatoes.
1 cup of bread-crumbs.
½ teaspoonful of salt.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
1 slice of onion.

Put the butter in the frying-pan, and when it bubbles put in the bread-crumbs, the salt, and onion, with a dusting of pepper, and stir till the crumbs are a little brown and the onion is all cooked; then take out the onion and throw it away. Wipe the tomatoes with a clean wet cloth, and cut out the stem and a round hole or little well in the middle; fill this with the crumbs, piling them up [64] well on top; put them in a baking-dish and stand them in a hot oven; mix a cup of hot water with a tablespoonful of butter, and every little while take out the baking-dish and wet the tomatoes on top. Cook them about half an hour, or till the skins get wrinkled all over. Serve them in the dish they are cooked in, if you like, or put each one on a small plate; pour some of the juice in the baking-dish over it, and stick a sprig of parsley in the top.

STUFFED POTATOES

Wash six large potatoes, and scrub them with a little brush till they are a nice clean light brown, and bake them for half an hour in a hot oven; or, if they are quite large, bake them till they are soft and puffy. Cut off one end from each and take out the inside with a teaspoon, holding the potato in a [65] towel as you do so, for it will be very hot. Mix well this potato with two tablespoonfuls of rich milk or cream, a half-teaspoonful of salt and just as much butter, and put this back into the shells. Stand the potatoes side by side in a pan close together, the open ends up, till they are browned.

PASTRY FOR PORK PIES

6 ozs. of lard to 1 lb. of flour.
Pinch of salt.
1 pint of boiling milk.

Six pounds of flour generally makes seven pies.

Put the flour into a deep pan, rub in the lard till not a bit is left, add the salt. Make a hole in the centre of flour, take the boiling milk, pour with the left hand and stir with a large wooden spoon with the right hand. Work all together into a stiff paste. It may want a little more milk, so it is best to have more ready.

[66] When all the flour is well worked in, knead it for twenty minutes (near the fire), it should then be quite smooth. Cover over to keep warm, but not too near the fire, and in an hour’s time it will be ready for use.

FRENCH DRESSING

3 tablespoonfuls of oil.
½ tablespoonful of lemon juice or vinegar.
½ teaspoonful of salt.
3 shakes of pepper.

Stir together till all is well mixed.

Many people prefer this dressing without pepper and with a saltspoonful of sugar in its place; you can try it both ways.

TOMATO AND LETTUCE SALAD

Peel four tomatoes; you can do this most easily by pouring boiling water [67] over them and skinning them when they wrinkle, but you must drain off all the water afterward, and let them get firm in the refrigerator; wash the lettuce and gently pat it dry with a clean cloth; slice the tomatoes thin, pour off the juice, and arrange four slices on each plate of lettuce, or mix them together in the large bowl, and pour the dressing over.

EGG SALAD

Cut up six hard-boiled eggs into quarters, lay them on lettuce, and pour the dressing over.

HAM MOUSSE

Whip two gills of cream stiffly, and stir into this one gill of liquid aspic and half-pound of cold cooked minced ham, and just enough cochineal to make [68] it all a very delicate pink. Whip this together for two or three minutes, pack it into a tall slender mould, and set it on ice for two or three hours.

CAULIFLOWER SALAD

Take cold boiled cauliflower and pick it up into nice pieces; pour the dressing over, and put on the ice till you need it.

PORK-PIE MEAT

One pound of pork meat and about three ounces of pork fat. Cut this up into small squares. Flavour this with a quarter-ounce of salt and a quarter-ounce of pepper. Put this into your pie-crust and bake for three hours. The paste must be brushed over with egg, so that it looks yellow when it is cooked. Be careful it does not burn.

Have some stock made from pork [69] bones which has been flavoured with about one ounce of whole mixed spice and pepper and salt. When the pie is warm, cut a small hole in the top and pour into it as much of the stock as the pie will hold. When cold it will have jelly inside it.

HASH (ORDINARY)

Cut up into slices any cold meat, removing all fat and sinews. Put in a saucepan an ounce of butter and a tablespoonful of flour. Mix together when hot, and add a pint of stock; colour it with browning, and add salt and pepper to taste and a teaspoonful of Worcester sauce.

BRAWN

To a pig’s head weighing six pounds, add one and a half pounds of lean beef, [70] two tablespoonfuls of salt, half a teaspoonful of pepper, three pounded cloves, and half a blade of mace. Boil the beef and head three hours. Take away all the bones, chop the meat up, add the seasoning and some of the liquor it is boiled in, to make it moist, and put it in a mould and turn out when cold.

MAYONNAISE

Yolk of 1 egg.
½ cup of olive-oil.
1 tablespoonful of lemon juice or vinegar.
½ teaspoonful of salt.
Pinch of red pepper.

Put the yolk of the egg into a very cold bowl; it is better to put the bowl, the egg, the oil, and the beater all on the ice a half-hour before you need them, for then the mayonnaise comes [71] quicker. Beat the egg till the yolk is very light indeed; then let some one else begin to put in the oil, one drop at a time, till the mayonnaise becomes so thick it is difficult to beat; then put in a drop or two of lemon or vinegar, and this will thin it so that you can use the oil again; keep on doing this till you have nearly a cup of the dressing. If you need more oil than the recipe calls for, use it, and towards the last add two or three drops at a time. When you have enough, and it is stiff enough, put in the pepper and salt and it is done. Never use mustard except with lobster, as this will spoil the taste. Some salads, especially vegetable, need very thick mayonnaise, and then it is better to make it with lemon juice, while one to use with meats may be thinner, and then the vinegar will do; the lemon juice makes it thick. Always taste it before using it, to see if it is just right, [72] and, if not, put in more salt, or whatever it needs. You will soon learn. Most people think mayonnaise is very difficult to make, but, really, it is as easy as baking potatoes, after you have once learned how. Every salad given before is just as nice with mayonnaise as with French dressing, and you can try each one both ways; then there are these, which are better with mayonnaise:

CHICKEN SALAD

1 cup of chicken, cut in large bits.
½ cup of celery, cut up and then dried.
2 hard-boiled eggs, cut into good-sized pieces.
6 olives, stoned and cut up.
½ cup of mayonnaise.

Mix all very lightly together, as stirring will make the salad messy; put on lettuce.

[73]

LOBSTER SALAD

1 cup of lobster, cut in large bits.
2 hard-boiled eggs, cut in pieces.
½ teaspoonful of dry mustard, stirred in.
½ cup of mayonnaise.

Mix and put on lettuce.

CELERY SALAD

2 heads of celery.
3 hard-boiled eggs (or else 1 cup of English walnuts).
½ cup of very stiff mayonnaise.

Wash, wipe, and cut the celery into pieces as large as the first joint of your little finger, and then rub it in a clean towel till it is as dry as can be. Cut up the eggs, sprinkle all with salt, and add the mayonnaise and lay on lettuce. Or mix the celery and the walnuts and mayonnaise; either salad is nice.

[74]

SCOTCH WOODCOCK

Cut one or two slices of bread half an inch thick, toast it and butter it well. Spread over it some anchovy paste and cut into as many pieces as you require. Have a saucepan ready and one egg for each person; just break the yolks and half an ounce of butter to each egg. Put salt and pepper into it, put it on the fire and stir till it becomes thick, then add one tablespoonful of cream. Put the buttered eggs on the top of the anchovy toast and serve very hot. The buttered egg must not be too thick.

SHRIMP TOAST

Mix in a stewpan the yolks of two eggs, a tablespoonful cream, one teaspoonful anchovy sauce. Soak in this a thick round of buttered toast. Peel [75] some shrimps and place on the toast and serve very hot.

TO PICKLE BEEF OR TONGUE

Put into a large saucepan four quarts of cold water, two pounds common salt, two ounces of saltpetre, half-pound brown pickling sugar, a few peppercorns, four bay-leaves, six cloves.

Let it all boil up well; then skim. When cold pour into an earthenware pan; then put in the meat and turn it every day for ten or fourteen days.

TONGUE TOAST

Grate finely the remains of a tongue, and mix it with the yolk of an egg, a tablespoonful of cream, finely chopped parsley, pepper, and a little salt.

Make it very hot, but not boiling, and pour it on to fingers of well-buttered toast.

[76] Grated ham can also be prepared exactly the same, with a little fine chopped onion if liked.

CHEESE STRAWS

One ounce grated cheese, one ounce butter, slightly over one ounce of flour, a little pepper and salt.

Put all into a basin and work into a stiff paste; then roll out and cut them evenly with a knife in lengths. Place on a baking-sheet, a little distance apart, and bake in a warm oven about ten minutes, but they must be watched, so as not to get too brown. They should be a pale straw colour.

POTATO SALAD

3 cold boiled potatoes.
3 hard-boiled eggs.
½ cup of English walnuts.
12 olives.

[77] Break up the walnuts, saving a dozen halves unbroken. Cut the potatoes and eggs into bits of even size, as large as the tip of your finger; stone the olives and cut them up, too; mix them together in a bowl, but do not stir them much, or you will break the potatoes; sprinkle well with French dressing, and put on the ice; when it is lunch or supper time, mix quickly, only once, with stiff mayonnaise, and put on lettuce. This is a delicious salad to have with cold meats.

Margaret’s mother liked to have gingerbread for lunch often, so those things came next in the cookery-book.

GINGERBREAD

1 cup of sugar.
1 egg.
1 teaspoonful of soda. [78]
1 teaspoonful of ginger.
1 tablespoonful of melted butter.
½ cup of milk.
2 cups of flour.

Beat the eggs without separating, but very light; put the soda into the sugar, put them in the milk, with the ginger and butter, then one cup of flour—measure in a medium-sized cup and only level full—then the egg, and last the rest of the flour. Bake in a buttered biscuit-tin. For a change, sometimes add a teaspoonful of cloves and cinnamon, mixed, to this, and a cup of chopped raisins put in the flour, or a cup of chopped almonds.

SOFT GINGERBREAD, TO BE EATEN HOT

1 cup sugar.
½ cup boiling water.
¼ cup melted butter.
1½ cups flour. [79]
¾ teaspoonful soda.
1 teaspoonful ginger.
½ teaspoonful salt.

Put the soda in the sugar and beat it well in a good-sized bowl; then put in the melted butter, ginger, salt, and flour, and beat again; and add last the water, very hot indeed. Have a buttered tin ready, and put it at once in the oven; when half-baked, it is well to put a piece of paper over it, as all gingerbread burns easily.

You can add cloves and cinnamon to this recipe, and sometimes you can make it and serve it hot as a pudding, with a sauce of sugar and water, thickened and flavoured.

GINGER BUNS

½ cup butter.
1 cup sugar.
½ cup brown sugar. [80]
1 teaspoonful ginger.
1 tablespoonful mixed cinnamon and cloves.
1 teaspoonful soda, dissolved in a tablespoonful of water.
Flour enough to make it so stiff you cannot stir it with a spoon.

Melt the sugar and butter together on the stove, and then take the saucepan off and add the rest of the things in the recipe, and turn the dough out on a floured board and roll it very thin, and cut in circles with a biscuit-cutter. Put a little flour on the bottom of four shallow pans, lift the buns with the cake-turner and lay them in, and put them in the oven. They will bake very quickly, so you must watch them. When you want these to be extra nice, put a teaspoonful of mixed cinnamon and cloves in them and sprinkle the tops with sugar.

[81]

GRANDMOTHER’S SUGAR BUNS

1 cup of butter.
2 cups of sugar.
2 eggs.
1 cup of milk.
2 teaspoonfuls of baking-powder.
½ teaspoonful of vanilla.
Flour enough to roll out easily.

Rub the butter and sugar to a cream; put in the milk, then the eggs beaten together lightly, then two cups of flour, into which you have sifted the baking-powder; then the vanilla. Take a bit of this and put it on the floured board and see if it “rolls out easily,” and, if it does not, but is soft and sticky, put in a handful more of flour. These buns must not be any stiffer than you can help, or they will not be good, so try not to use any more flour than you are obliged to.

[82]

TEA

1 teaspoonful of black tea for each person.
1 teaspoonful for the pot.
Boiling water.

Fill the kettle half-full of fresh, cold water, because you cannot make good tea with water which has been once heated. When it is very hot, fill the teapot and put it where it will keep warm. When the water boils very hard, empty out the teapot, put in the tea, and pour on it the boiling water; do not stand it on the stove, as too many people do, but send it right to the table; it will be ready as soon as it is time to pour out—about three minutes. If you are making tea for only one person, you will need two teaspoonfuls of tea, as you will see by the recipe, and two small cups of water will be enough. If for more, put in a teaspoonful for [83] each person, and one cup of water more.

GINGER BEER

4 gallons water.
4 lbs. lump sugar.
4 oz. ginger.
3 oz. cream of tartar.
4 lemons.

Bruise the ginger and slice the lemons; take out the pips, then put all the ingredients into a pan and pour over the boiling water. Let it stand until it is luke-warm, then add one tablespoonful of fresh barm put on a piece of toasted bread to remain on the top. If this is done at night it will be ready to bottle next morning.

LEMONADE

Slice up six lemons and pour over them three quarts of boiling water and [84] enough sugar to taste. Can be used when cold.

CHOCOLATE

2 cups of boiling water.
2 cups of boiling milk.
4 teaspoonfuls of grated chocolate.
4 teaspoonfuls of sugar.

Scrape the chocolate off the bar, mix it with the boiling water, and stir till it dissolves; mix the milk and sugar in them and boil for one minute. If you wish to have it nicer, put a small teaspoonful of vanilla in the chocolate-pot, and pour the hot chocolate in on it when it is done, and have a little bowl of whipped cream to send to the table with it, so that one spoonful may be put on top of each cup.

COCOA

6 teaspoonfuls of cocoa.
1½ cups of boiling water. [85]
1½ cups of boiling milk.
1 tablespoonful of powdered sugar.

Put the cocoa into the boiling water and stir till it dissolves, then put in the boiling milk and boil hard two minutes, stirring it all the time: take from the fire and put in the sugar and stir again. If you like it quite sweet, you may have to use more sugar.

[86]

[88]

[89]

At first, of course, Margaret could not get dinner all alone; indeed, it took her almost a year to learn how to cook everything needed—soup, vegetables, meat, salad, and sweets; but at first she helped the cook, and each day she cooked something. Then she began to arrange very easy dinners when cook was out, such as cream soup, beefsteak or veal cutlets, with potatoes and one vegetable, and a plain lettuce salad, with a cold sweet made in the morning. The first time she really did every single thing alone, Margaret’s father gave her half a crown; he said it was a “tip” for the best dinner he ever ate.

[90]

SOUPS

STOCK FOR ORDINARY SOUP

Put all the bones you have left from any joints, break them up small and put in a large saucepan and fill with cold water till the bones are covered. Put in an onion, carrot, and a small stick of celery. Boil all down till the bones become quite clean. Pour off into a basin, and when wanted remove the fat from the top and flavour it with what vegetable you want your soup made of, such as celery, or pea.

VEGETABLE MARROW SOUP

Peel and cut in quarters a small marrow and remove the seeds. Melt an ounce of butter in a stewpan and put in the marrow with a little pepper and salt, a lump of sugar, and a grate of [91] nutmeg. Toss it over fire for a few minutes, and moisten with as much white stock as will cover it. Let it stew gently till tender, and then pass through a fine hair-sieve. Put then with it as much boiling stock as will make it the thickness of cream. Add half a pint of cream and season with pepper and salt. Put over the fire till very hot. Tomato soup is made the same way.

CREAM OF POTATO

This is one of the best and most delicate soups.

5 freshly boiled potatoes.
1 slice of onion.
1 quart of stock.
1 small teaspoonful of salt.
1 teaspoonful of chopped parsley.

Boil the onion and salt in the stock. It requires no thickening, as if the [92] potatoes are passed through a sieve and added to the stock they will make it thick enough. Add the parsley after the soup is in the tureen, as it will turn brown if put in too soon. The yolk of an egg, beaten, can be added, if required, to make the soup richer.

CREAM OF SPINACH

1 pint of cold cooked spinach.
1 quart of stock.

Heat the spinach, using a little of the quart of stock with it, and press through the sieve; thicken the rest of the stock and the seasoning, and strain again. It is better to use cayenne pepper instead of black with spinach.

CREAM OF TOMATO SOUP, CALLED TOMATO BISQUE

6 large tomatoes, cut up.
2 slices onion. [93]
2 sprigs parsley.
1 teaspoonful sugar.
½ teaspoonful salt.
1 quart stock.
1 tablespoonful butter.
1 tablespoonful flour.

Cook the tomatoes with the onion, parsley, sugar, and salt for twenty minutes, with a little of the stock. Make the stock and flour and butter into white sauce as usual; strain the tomato, mix the two, and strain through a sieve.

Sometimes add a stalk of celery to the other seasoning as it cooks, and a little cream before serving.

OYSTER SOUP

1 pint oysters.
1 quart rich stock.
½ teaspoonful salt.

Drain off the oyster juice, add the [94] stock, boil it for one minute, and skim it well. Then drop in the oysters and cook one minute, or till the edges begin to curl, and it is done. This soup is not thickened at all; but if you like you may add two tablespoonfuls of cream.

MEAT SOUPS

You can make meat soup, or stock, out of almost any kind of meat, cooked or raw, with bones or without. Many cooks never buy fresh meat for it, and others think they must always have it. It is best to learn both ways.

PLAIN MEAT SOUP

5 lbs. of shin of beef.
5 quarts of water.
1 small tablespoonful of salt.
1 head of celery, cut up.
1 onion. [95]
1 carrot.
1 turnip.
1 sprig of parsley.
2 bay-leaves.
6 whole cloves.

Cut the meat off the bone. Put the bone in a clean saucepan first, and then the meat on top, and pour in the water; cover, and let this stand on the back of the stove an hour, then draw it forward and let it cook. This will bring scum on the water in half an hour, and you must carefully pour in a cup of cold water and skim off everything which rises to the top. Cover the saucepan tightly, and cook very slowly indeed for four hours; then put in the cut-up vegetables and cook one hour more, always just simmering, not boiling hard. Then it is done, and you can put in the salt, and strain the soup first through a heavy wire sieve, and then through a flannel bag, and set it away to get cold, [96] and you will have a strong, clear, delicious stock, which you can put many things in to have variety.

CLEAR VEGETABLE SOUP

Slice one carrot, one turnip, and one potato, and cut them either into small, even strips, or into tiny cubes, or take a vegetable cutter and cut out fancy shapes. Simmer them about twenty minutes in a little water. Meanwhile, take two pints of soup stock and heat it. Sprinkle a little salt over the vegetables and drain them; put them in the soup-tureen and pour the hot soup over.

SPLIT PEA SOUP

1 pint of split peas.
1½ quarts of boiling water.
1 quart of soup stock. [97]
1 small teaspoonful of salt.
3 shakes of pepper.

Wash the peas in cold water and throw away those which float, as they are bad. Soak them overnight, and in the morning pour away the water on them and cover them with a quart of the boiling water in the recipe, and cook an hour and a half. Put in the rest of the water and the stock, and press the whole through a sieve, and, after washing and wiping the saucepan, put the soup back to heat, adding the salt and pepper.

TOMATO SOUP

1 tin tomatoes, or 1 quart of fresh stewed ones.
1 pint of stock.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
2 tablespoonfuls of flour.
1 teaspoonful of sugar.
1 small onion, cut up. [98]
1 sprig of parsley.
1 bay-leaf.
1 small teaspoonful of salt.
3 shakes of pepper.

Put the tomatoes into a saucepan with the parsley, onion, bay-leaf, and stock, and cook fifteen minutes, and then strain through a sieve. Wash the saucepan and put the tomatoes back in it, and put on to boil again; melt the butter, rub smooth with the flour, and put into the soup while it boils, and stir till it is perfectly smooth. Then add the sugar, salt and pepper, and soda, and strain into the hot tureen. Serve croûtons with this soup. They are made by cutting tiny little squares of bread and fried in a little butter till they become crisp.

CHICKEN OR TURKEY SOUP

Break up the bones and cover with cold water; add a slice of onion, a bay-leaf, [99] and a sprig of parsley, and cook all day, adding water when necessary, and skimming. Cool, take off the grease, heat again, and strain. Serve with small, even squares of chicken meat in it, or a little cooked rice and salt. Many people like a small pinch of cinnamon in turkey soup.

VEGETABLES

MASHED POTATOES

6 large potatoes.
½ cup hot milk.
Butter the size of a walnut.
3 teaspoonfuls salt.
3 shakes of pepper.

Peel and boil the potatoes till tender; then turn off the water and stand them on the back of the stove with a cover half over them, where they will keep hot while they get dry and floury, but [100] do not let them burn; shake the saucepan every little while. Heat the milk with the butter, salt, and pepper in it; mash the potatoes well, either with the wooden potato-masher or with a wire one, and put in the milk little by little. When they are all free from lumps, pile them lightly in the vegetable-dish as they are. Do not smooth them over the top.

BEETS

Wash the beets but do not peel them. Boil them gently for three-quarters of an hour, or till they can be pierced easily with a straw. Then skin them and slice in a hot dish, dusting each layer with a little salt, pepper, and melted butter. Those which are left over may have a little vinegar poured over them, to make them into pickles for luncheon.

[101] Once Margaret made something very nice by a recipe her Aunt put in her book. It was called—

STUFFED BEETS

1 tin French peas.
6 medium-sized beets.

Boil the beets as before and skin them, but leave them whole. Heat the peas after the juice has been turned off, and season them with salt and pepper. Cut off the stem end of each beet so that it will stand steadily, and scoop a round place in the other end; sprinkle each beet with salt and pepper, and put a tiny bit of butter down in this little well, and then fill it high with the peas it will hold.

PEAS

Shell them and drop them into a saucepan of boiling water, into which [102] you have put a teaspoonful of salt and a pinch of soda. Boil them till they are tender, from fifteen minutes, if they are fresh from the garden, to half an hour or more, if they have stood in the grocer’s a day or two. When they are done they will have little dents in their sides, and you can easily mash two or three with a fork on a plate. Then drain off the water, put in three shakes of pepper, more salt if they do not taste just right, and a piece of butter the size of a walnut, and shake them till the butter melts; serve in a hot covered dish.

FRENCH BEANS

Pull off the strings and cut off the ends; hold three or four beans in your hand and cut them into long, very narrow strips, not into square pieces. [103] Then cook them exactly as you did the peas.

STEWED TOMATOES

6 large tomatoes.
1 teaspoonful of salt.
1 teaspoonful of sugar.
3 shakes of pepper.
Butter as large as a walnut.

Peel and cut the tomatoes up small, saving the juice; put together in a saucepan with the seasoning. Simmer twenty minutes, stirring till it is smooth, and last put in half a cup of bread-crumbs. Serve in a hot, covered dish.

ASPARAGUS

Untie the bunch, scrape the stalks clean, and put it in cold water for half an hour. Tie the bunch again, and cut enough off the white ends to make all [104] the pieces of the same length. Stand them in boiling water in a saucepan, and cook gently for about twenty minutes. Lay on a dish, on squares of buttered toast.

ONIONS

Peel off the outside skin and cook them in boiling, salted water till they are tender; drain them, put them in a baking-dish, and pour over them a tablespoonful of melted butter, three shakes of pepper, and a sprinkling of salt, and put in the oven and brown a very little. Or, cover them with a cup of white sauce instead of the melted butter, and sprinkle with salt and pepper, but do not put in the oven.

FRIED POTATOES

Wash and peel sufficient potatoes, then chop them fine, and put them into [105] cold water. Put some bacon dripping into an iron frying-pan, and when very hot turn the potatoes into it (previously dried by pressing in a clean cloth). Add salt and pepper. Cook until soft; then draw the pan to a hotter part of the stove and brown. Serve very hot.

CARROT CROQUETTES

Wash and scrape a sufficient number of carrots; stew them until very soft, drain and mash and season with salt, pepper, and butter; then bind together with the yolk of an egg. When cool enough to handle, shape into balls, dredge with brown bread-crumbs, and fry in deep fat till brown. Serve up with parsley.

MACARONI

6 long pieces of macaroni.
1 cup of white sauce. [106]
½ pound of cheese.
Pepper and salt.

Break up the macaroni into small pieces, and boil fifteen minutes in salted water, shaking the saucepan often. Pour off the water. Butter a dish, put in a layer of macaroni, a good sprinkle of salt, then a very little white sauce, and a layer of grated cheese, sprinkled over with a tiny dusting of pepper; only use a tiny bit. Then cover with a thin layer of white sauce, and so on till the dish is full, with the last layer of white sauce covered with an extra thick one of the cheese. Bake till brown.

Margaret’s mother got this recipe in Paris, and she thought it a very nice one.

After the soup, meat, and vegetables at dinner came the salad; for this Margaret almost always had lettuce, with French dressing, as mayonnaise seemed [107] too heavy for dinner. Sometimes she had nice watercress; very occasionally she had celery with mayonnaise.

SWEETS

BLANCMANGE

1 pint of milk.
2 heaping tablespoonfuls of cornflour.
3 tablespoonfuls of sugar.
Whites of three eggs.
½ teaspoonful of vanilla.

Beat the whites of the eggs very stiff. Mix the cornflour with half a cup of the milk, and stir it till it melts. Mix the rest of the milk and the sugar, and put them on the fire in the double saucepan. When it bubbles, stir up the cornflour and milk well, and stir them in and cook and stir till it gets as thick as oatmeal; then turn in the eggs [108] and stir them lightly, and cook for a minute more. Take it off the stove, mix in the vanilla, and put in a mould to cool. When dinner is ready, turn it out on a dish and put small bits of red jelly round it, or pieces of preserved ginger, or a pretty circle of preserved peaches, or preserved pineapple. Have a pitcher of cream to pass with it, or have a nice bowl of whipped cream. If you have a ring-mould, let it harden in that, and have the whipped cream piled in the centre after it is on the dish, and put the jelly or preserves round last.

CHOCOLATE BLANCMANGE

Use the same recipe as before, but put in one more tablespoonful of sugar. Then shave thin two squares of chocolate, and stand on the fire till it melts, and stir it in very thoroughly before you put in the eggs. Instead of pouring [109] this into one large mould, put it in egg-cups to harden; turn these out carefully, each on a separate plate, and put a spoonful of whipped cream by each one.

BAKED CUSTARD

2 cups of milk.
Yolks of two eggs.
2 tablespoonfuls of sugar.
A little nutmeg.

Beat the eggs till they are light; mix the milk and sugar till the sugar melts; put the two together, and pour into a nice baking-dish, or into small cups, and dust the nutmeg over the tops. Bake till the top is brown, and till when you put a knife-blade into the custard it comes out clean.

COCOANUT CUSTARD

Add a cup of cocoanut to the above recipe and bake it in one dish, stirring [110] it up two or three times from the bottom, but, after it begins to brown, leaving it alone to finish. Do not put any nutmeg on it.

TAPIOCA PUDDING

2 tablespoonfuls of tapioca.
Yolks of two eggs.
½ cup of sugar.
1 quart of milk.

Put the tapioca into a small half-cup of water and let it stand one hour. Then drain it and put it in the milk in the double saucepan, and cook and stir it till the tapioca looks clear, like glass. Beat the eggs and mix the sugar with them, and beat again till both are light, and put them with the milk and tapioca and cook three minutes, stirring all the time. Then take it off the fire and add a saltspoonful of salt and a half-teaspoonful [111] of vanilla, and let it get perfectly cold.

FLOATING ISLAND

1 pint of milk.
3 eggs.
⅓ cup of sugar.

Put the milk on the stove to heat in a good-sized pan. Beat the whites of the eggs very stiff, and as soon as the milk scalds—that is, gets a little wrinkled on top—drop spoonfuls of the egg on to it in little islands; let them stand there to cook just one minute, and then with the skimmer take them off and lay them on a plate. Put the milk where it will keep hot, but not boil, while you beat the yolks of the eggs stiff, mixing in the sugar and beating that, too. Pour the milk into the bowl of egg, a little at a time, beating all the while, and then put it in the [112] double boiler and cook till it is as thick as cream. Take it off the fire, stir in a saltspoonful of salt and half a teaspoonful of vanilla, and set it away to cool. When it is dinner-time, strain the custard into a pretty dish and slip the whites off on top, one by one. If you like, you can dot them over with very tiny specks of red jelly.

CAKE AND CUSTARD

Make a plain boiled custard, just as before, with—

1 pint of milk.
Yolks of three eggs.
⅓ cup of sugar.
1 saltspoonful of salt.
½ teaspoonful of vanilla.

Beat the eggs and sugar, add the hot milk, and cook till creamy; put in the salt and vanilla, and cool. Then cut [113] stale cake into strips, or split ladyfingers into halves, and spread with jam. Put them on the sides and bottom of a flat glass dish, and gently pour the custard over.

APPLE CHARLOTTE

Peel, core, and slice six apples. Butter a baking-dish and sprinkle the inside all over with fine bread-crumbs. Then take six very thin slices of buttered bread and line the sides and bottom of the dish. Put a layer of apples an inch thick, a thin layer of brown sugar, six small pieces of butter, and a dusting of cinnamon, another layer of crumbs, another of apples and sugar, and so on till the dish is full, with crumbs and butter on top, and three tablespoonfuls of sugar poured over. Bake this one hour.

[114]

LEMON PUDDING

1 cup of sugar.
4 eggs.
2 lemons.
1 pint of milk.
1 tablespoonful of granulated sugar.
2 tablespoonfuls of cornflour.
1 pinch of salt.

Wet the cornflour with half a cup of the milk, and heat what is left. Stir up the cornflour well, and when the milk is hot put it in and stir; then boil five minutes, stirring all the time. Melt the butter, and put that in with a pinch of salt, and cool it. Beat the yolks of the eggs, and add the sugar, the juice of both lemons, and the grated rind of one, pour into the milk, and stir well; put in a buttered baking-dish and bake till slightly brown. Take it out of the oven; beat the whites of two of the eggs with a tablespoonful of granulated [115] sugar, and pile lightly on top, and put in the oven again till it is just brown. This is a very nice recipe.

RICE PUDDING WITH RAISINS

1 quart of milk.
2 tablespoonfuls of rice.
⅓ cup of sugar.
½ cup of seeded raisins.

Wash the rice and the raisins and stir everything together till the sugar dissolves; then put it in a baking-dish in the oven. Every little while open the door and see if a light brown crust is forming on top, and, if it is, stir the pudding all up from the bottom and push down the crust. Keep on doing this till the rice swells and makes the milk all thick and creamy, which it will after about an hour. Then let the pudding cook, and when it is a nice deep [116] brown take it out and let it get very cold.

BREAD PUDDING

2 cups of milk.
1 cup of soft bread-crumbs.
1 tablespoonful of sugar.
2 egg yolks.
1 egg white.
½ teaspoonful of vanilla.
1 saltspoonful of salt.

Crumb the bread evenly and soak in the milk till soft. Beat it till smooth, and put in the beaten yolks of the eggs, the sugar, vanilla, and salt, and last the beaten white of the egg. Put it in a buttered pudding-dish, and stand this in a pan of hot water in the oven for fifteen minutes. Take it out and spread its top with jam, and cover with the beaten white of the other egg, with one tablespoonful of granulated sugar put in it, and brown in the oven. You [117] can eat this as it is, or with cream, and you may serve it either hot or cold.

Sometimes you can put a cup of washed raisins into the bread-crumbs and milk, and mix in the other things; sometimes you can put in a cup of chopped almonds, or a little preserved ginger. Marmalade is especially nice on bread pudding.

ORANGE PUDDING

Make just like Lemon Pudding, but use three oranges instead of two lemons.

CABINET PUDDING

1 pint of milk.
Yolks of 3 eggs.
3 tablespoonfuls of sugar.
1 saltspoonful of salt.

Beat the eggs, add the sugar, and stir them into the milk, which must be [118] very hot, but not boiling; stir till it thickens, and then take it from the fire. Put a layer of washed raisins in the bottom of a mould, then a layer of slices of stale cake or Savoy biscuits; then more raisins round the edge of the mould, and more cake, till the mould is full. Pour the custard over very slowly, so the cake will soak well, and bake in a pan of water in the oven for an hour. This pudding is to be eaten hot, with any sauce you like, such as Foamy Sauce.

Cut-up figs are nice to use with the raisins, and chopped nuts are a delicious addition, dropped between the layers of cake.

COTTAGE PUDDING

1 egg.
1 cup sugar.
½ cup milk.
1½ teaspoonfuls baking-powder.

[119] Beat the yolk of the egg light, add the sugar slowly, and beat more, then put in the milk, the flour, the whites of the eggs beaten stiff, and last of all the baking-powder, and stir it up well. Put in a greased pan and bake nearly half an hour. If you want this very nice, put in half a cup of chopped figs, mixed with part of the flour.

Serve with Foamy Sauce.

PRUNE WHIPS

This was a cookery-school recipe which the Aunt put in, because she said it was the best sort of a pudding for little girls to make and like.

1 tablespoonful of powdered sugar.
2 tablespoonfuls of stewed prunes.
White of 1 egg.

Cook the prunes till soft, take out the stones, and mash the prunes fine. Beat the white of the egg very stiff, [120] mix in the sugar and prunes, and bake in small buttered dishes. Serve hot or cold, with cream.

JUNKET

1 junket tablet.
1 quart milk.
½ cup sugar.
1 teaspoonful vanilla.

Break up the junket tablet—or rennet can be used—into small pieces, and put them into a tablespoonful of water to dissolve. Put the sugar into the milk with the vanilla, and stir till it is dissolved. Warm the milk a little, but only till it is as warm as your finger, so that if you try it by touching it with the tip, you do not feel it at all as colder or warmer. Then quickly turn in the water with the tablet melted in it, stirring it only once, and pour immediately into small cups on the table. These [121] must stand for half an hour without being moved, and then the junket will be stiff. In winter you must warm the cups till they are like the milk. This is very nice with a spoonful of whipped cream on each cup, and bits of preserved ginger or of jelly on it.

STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE

Margaret’s mother called this the Thousand Mile Shortcake, because she sent so far for the recipe to the place where she had once eaten it, when she thought it the best she had ever tasted.

1 pint flour.
½ cup butter.
1 egg.
1 teaspoonful baking-powder.
½ cup milk.
1 saltspoonful salt.

[122] Mix the baking-powder and salt with the flour and sift all together. The butter should stand on the kitchen table till it is warm and ready to melt, when it may be mixed in with a spoon, and then the egg, well beaten, and the milk.

Divide the dough into halves; put one in a round biscuit-tin, butter it, and lay the other half on top, evenly. Bake a light brown. When you take it out of the oven, let it cool, and then lift the layer apart. Mash the strawberries, keeping out some of the biggest ones for the top of the cake, and put on the bottom layer; put a small half-cup of powdered sugar on them, and put the top layer on. Dust this over with sugar till it is white, and set the large berries about on it, or cover the top with whipped cream and put the strawberries on this.

[123]

SHORTCAKE

1 small cup sugar.
½ cup butter.
1 cup cold water.
1 egg.
2 cups flour.
3 teaspoonfuls baking-powder.

Rub the butter and sugar to a cream; sift the flour and baking-powder together; beat the egg stiff without separating; put the egg with the sugar and butter, add the water and flour in turn, a little at a time, stirring steadily; bake in two layer-tins. Put jam between them and on top.

Tiny field strawberries make the most delicious shortcake of all.

LEMON CHEESE CAKES

¾ lb. of loaf sugar.
4 oz. of fresh butter. [124]
Yolks of 6 eggs.
Whites of 4 eggs.
Peel of 3 lemons grated.
Juice of 3 lemons.

Put the lemon juice and grated rind, together with the sugar and butter, into a brass pan; add the eggs gradually lest they curdle. Then simmer over the fire until as thick as honey, stirring gently all the time.

Pour into small jars, and when cold paste paper over. Keep in a very dry place. Fill the patty-pans half-full, as it rises much in a quick oven. Puff paste should be used for these.

LEMON JELLY

½ box gelatine.
½ cup cold water.
2 cups boiling water.
1 cup sugar.

[125] Juice of 3 lemons, and three scrapings of the yellow rind.

Put the gelatine into the cold water and soak one hour. Put the boiling water, the sugar, and the scrapings of peel on the fire, and stir till the sugar dissolves. Take it off the fire and stir in the gelatine, and mix till this is dissolved; when it is partly cool, turn in the lemon juice and strain through a flannel bag dipped in water and wrung dry. Put into a pretty mould.

ORANGE JELLY

Make this exactly as you did the Lemon Jelly, only instead of taking the juice of three lemons, take the juice of two oranges and one lemon, and scrape the orange peel instead of the lemon peel.

Whipped cream is nicer with either of these jellies.

[126]

PRUNE JELLY

Wash well a cup of prunes, and cover them with cold water and soak overnight. In the morning put them on the fire in the same water, and simmer till so tender that the stones will slip out. Cut each prune in two and sprinkle with sugar as you lay them in the mould; pour over them lemon jelly made by the recipe above, and put on ice. Turn out on a pretty dish, and put whipped cream round.

FRUIT JELLY

Make a plain lemon jelly, as before. Cut up, very thin, two oranges, one banana, six figs, and a handful of white grapes, which you have seeded, and sweeten them. Put in a mould and pour in the jelly; as it begins to grow [127] firm you can gently lift the fruit from the bottom once or twice.

You can also fill the mould quite full of fruit, and make only half the jelly and pour over. Whipped cream is nice to eat with this.

STEWED RHUBARB

Wipe the rhubarb with a damp cloth. Cut into pieces about one inch long; put in a stewpan with enough water just to cover it, and put in sugar to suit taste. Cook till it becomes soft, but not mashed; let it simmer gently.

SNOW PUDDING

½ box of gelatine.
1 pint of cold water.
3 eggs.
Juice of 3 lemons.
½ cup of powdered sugar.

[128] Pour the water over the gelatine and let it stand ten minutes; then put the bowl over the fire and stir till it is dissolved, and take it off at once. As soon as it seems nearly cold, beat to a froth with the egg-beater. Beat the whites of the eggs stiffly, and add to the gelatine, with the lemon juice and sugar, and mix well. Put in a mould and set on ice. Make a soft custard by the recipe, and pour round the pudding when you serve it.

VELVET CREAM

¼ box of gelatine.
1 pint of milk.
2 eggs.
3 tablespoonfuls of sugar.
Small teaspoonful of vanilla.

Put the gelatine in the milk and soak fifteen minutes; put on the stove and heat till it steams, but do not let it [129] boil; stir carefully often, as there is danger of its burning. Beat the yolks of the eggs with the sugar, and put these in the custard, and cook till it all thickens and is smooth, but do not boil it. Strain, cool, and add the vanilla, and last fold in the beaten whites of the eggs, and put in a mould on the ice.

Preserved peaches laid round this are very nice, or rich pineapple, or apricot jam; or a ring of whipped cream, with bits of red jelly, make a pretty border.

COMPOTE OF ORANGES AND CHESTNUTS

Peel and quarter eight oranges, boil half-pound of lump sugar and half-pint of water till it becomes a syrup. Pour over quartered oranges whilst boiling, and let cool. Boil one and a half or two pounds of chestnuts until quite cooked; peel and put into a boiling [130] syrup, made as above, well flavoured with vanilla. Gently simmer for one and a half hours; when cool pass through a wire sieve. Pile up in centre of dish and place orange round; decorate with whipped cream and pistachio nuts (chopped).

CREAM BUNS OR ÉCLAIRS

½ pint water.
1 oz. butter
5 oz. fine flour.
3 eggs.
A little salt.

Put the water and butter in a saucepan over the fire to boil, then stir in five ounces of flour. Blend thoroughly till smooth and well cooked; break in the eggs and mix well together. Put the mixture out in pieces on a well-buttered baking-sheet and bake in a slow oven for one hour.

[131] Scoop out the inside and fill with whipped cream. Place the top on again and sift sugar over, or they can be covered with chocolate icing.

TREACLE SPONGE

½ lb. flour.
¼ lb. beef suet.
½ teaspoonful carbonate soda.
A pinch of salt.
1 teaspoonful ground ginger.
1 teacup golden syrup.
¼ pint milk.

Chop suet fine, put into a basin, add flour, soda, and ginger; mix syrup with the milk, stir this in the mixture; grease a mould and steam two hours.

Froth Sauce can be served round, or a little warmed golden syrup.

HARD SAUCE

Beat together a half-cup of powdered sugar and a half-cup of butter with a [132] fork till both are light and creamy. Flavour with a teaspoonful of vanilla and put on the ice to harden.

FOAMY SAUCE

½ cup butter.
½ cup boiling water.
1 cup powdered sugar.
1 teaspoonful vanilla.
White of 1 egg.

Rub the butter and sugar to a cream; add vanilla and beat well. When it is time to serve, beat the egg stiff, stir the boiling water into the sugar and butter, and then put in the egg and beat till foamy, standing it on the stove as you do so to keep it hot. Serve in the sauce-boat.

CHRISTMAS PUDDING

4 lbs. of raisins.
4 lbs. of currants. [133]
4 lbs. of mixed peel.
4 lbs. of beef suet.
2 lbs. of bread-crumbs.
2 lbs. of flour.
½ lb. of mixed spice.
3 lbs. of brown sugar.
16 or 20 eggs.
2 lbs. of chopped sweet almonds.
Rind of 4 lemons grated, and the juice.

Stone the raisins, wash the currants, chop the suet and peel, and put all dry ingredients together and mix well. Then add the whipped eggs and stir all together for half an hour; then add half a bottle of rum, half a bottle of brandy, and the juice of the lemons. Add spirits to taste; boil eight hours. Enough for twelve puddings.

FROTH SAUCE FOR PUDDINGS

Take a clean stewpan, break in two yolks of eggs, quarter-pint of cream, a wineglass of sherry, and a little sugar.

[134] Whisk well on the stove till it becomes thick and frothy, but not to curdle; then pour round the pudding. This sauce must not be made till just before it is wanted.

LEMON SAUCE

White of 1 egg.
½ cup of powdered sugar.
Juice of half a lemon.

Beat the egg, add the sugar and lemon, and beat again.

WHITE SAUCE

1 tablespoonful cornflour.
½ cup cold water.
1 cup boiling water.
½ cup powdered sugar.
Pinch of salt.
2 whites of eggs.
1 teaspoonful vanilla.

[135] Dissolve the cornflour in the cold water, and then add the boiling water and sugar and salt, and cook for fifteen minutes, stirring all the time. Take from the fire and fold in the stiffly beaten egg-whites with the flavouring, and beat till perfectly cold. Any flavouring will do for this sauce; pistache is very nice.

QUICK PUDDING SAUCE

1 egg.
½ cup powdered sugar.
1 teaspoonful vanilla.

Put the egg in a bowl without separating it and beat till very light; then pour in the sugar very slowly, beating all the time; add the vanilla and serve at once.

This is a very nice sauce, and so simple to make that Margaret learned it among the first of her recipes.

[136]

FRENCH PANCAKES

2 tablespoonfuls flour.
2 eggs.
1 oz. butter.
½ pint milk.

Rub the butter into the flour, beat the eggs, add the milk and mix all together. Put in well-buttered tins or saucers; bake twenty minutes in a quick oven.

ICE-CREAMS AND ICES

Margaret had a little ice-cream freezer which was all her own, and held only enough for two little girls to eat at a tea-party, and this she could pack alone. When she made ice-cream for all the family she had to use the larger freezer, of course, and this cook helped her pack. But the same recipe was used for either the large one or the small. First break up the ice in a [137] thick bag with a hammer until the pieces are no larger than eggs, and all about the same size. Then put two big bowls of this into a tub or pail, and add one bowl of coarse salt, and so on, till you have enough, mixing it well with a long-handled spoon. Put the freezer in its pail and put the cover on; then fill the space between with the ice and salt till it is full, pressing it down as you work. Let it stand now in a cool place, till you know the inside is very cold, and then wipe off the top carefully and pour in the cream, which must be very cold, too. Put on the top and turn smoothly and slowly till it is stiff, which should be fifteen minutes. Then draw off the water from the pail, wipe the top of the cover again, so that no salt can get in, and take out the dasher, pushing the cream down with a spoon from the sides and packing it firmly. Put a cork in the hole in the [138] cover, and put it on tightly. Mix more ice with a little salt—only a cupful to two bowls this time—and pack the freezer again up to the top. Wring out a heavy cloth in the salt water you drew off the pail, and cover it over tightly with this, and then stand in a cool, dark place till you need it; all ice-creams are better for standing two hours.

QUEEN’S PUDDING

1 breakfast-cup of bread-crumbs.
3 oz. of castor sugar.
1 rind of a lemon grated.
2 eggs.
1 breakfast-cup of milk.
2 oz. of butter.

Put bread-crumbs into a basin with lemon rind and sugar; warm the butter in the milk, separate yolks from whites, add the yolks when beaten to the milk and butter, and pour over the other [139] ingredients. Grease a pie-dish and put in mixture and bake until set. Leave till it is cold, spread over it raspberry jam, whip the whites to a stiff froth with a little sugar, pile high on the top and put it in the oven to dry, but not to brown.

PLAIN ICE-CREAM

3 cups of cream.
1 cup of milk.
1 small cup of sugar.
2 teaspoonfuls of vanilla.

Put the cream, milk, and sugar on the fire, and stir till the sugar dissolves and the cream just wrinkles on top; do not let it boil. Take it off, beat it till it is cold, add the vanilla, and freeze.

FRENCH ICE-CREAM

1 pint of milk.
1 cup of cream. [140]
1 cup of sugar.
4 eggs.
1 tablespoonful of vanilla.
1 saltspoonful of salt.

Put the milk on the fire and let it just scald or wrinkle. Beat the yolks of the eggs, put in the sugar, and beat again; then pour the hot milk into these slowly, and the salt, and put it on the fire in the double boiler and let it cook to a nice thick cream. (This is a plain boiled custard, such as you made for Floating Island.) Take it off and let it cool while you beat the whites of the eggs stiff, and then the cup of cream. Put the eggs in first lightly when the custard is entirely cold, and then the whipped cream last, and the vanilla, and freeze.

SUMMER PUDDING

Line a pudding-basin with slices of bread without crust, and cut out a [141] round for the bottom. Fill up with ripe raspberries or black currants, which have been stewed a little with sugar to make the syrup, but not long enough to destroy the colour. Put a plate on the top and a weight on it.

Next day turn out when required, and serve with whipped or plain cream.

COFFEE ICE-CREAM

Make either of these creams, and flavour with half a cup of strong coffee in place of vanilla.

CHOCOLATE ICE-CREAM

Make plain ice-cream; melt two squares of chocolate in a little saucepan. Mix a little of the milk or cream with this, and stir it smooth, and then put it in with the rest. You will need to use a large cup of sugar instead of a small one in making this, as the chocolate is not sweetened.

[142]

PEACH ICE-CREAM

Peel, cut up, and mash a cup of peaches. Make plain ice-cream, with a large cup of sugar, and when it is cold stir in the peaches and freeze.

STRAWBERRY ICE-CREAM

Mix a large cup of strawberries, mashed and strained carefully so that there are no seeds, with the ice-cream, and freeze.

ITALIAN CREAM

Yolks of 4 eggs.
½ pint milk.
½ pint double cream.
1 oz. castor sugar.
1 oz. melted gelatine.
1 wineglassful Chartreuse, or any liqueur.

Make a custard with the yolks and milk; add the sugar.

[143]

LEMON ICE

1 quart water.
4 lemons.
2½ cups sugar.
1 orange.

Boil the sugar and water for ten minutes; strain it and add the juice of the lemons and orange; cool and freeze.

ORANGE ICE

1 quart water.
6 oranges.
1 lemon.
2½ cups sugar.

Prepare exactly as you did Lemon Ice.

STRAWBERRY ICE

1 quart water.
2½ cups sugar.
1½ cups strawberry juice, strained.

Prepare like Lemon Ice.

[144]

RASPBERRY ICE

1 quart water.
2½ cups sugar.
1½ cups raspberry-juice, strained.

Prepare like Lemon Ice.

When Margaret wanted to make her own freezer full of ice-cream, she just took a cup of cream and heated it with the sugar, and when it was cold put in three drops of vanilla, and froze it.

CAKE

Next after the ices in her book, Margaret found the cake to eat with them, and first of all there was a recipe for some little cakes which the smallest girl in the neighbourhood used to make all alone.

[145]

CHOCOLATE ICING FOR CAKES

Whites of 2 eggs.
¼ pound icing sugar.
3 oz. grated chocolate.

Melt the chocolate in a stewpan with a tablespoonful of milk, and mix it with the sugar. When cool, stir in the whites, which have been well beaten, and use.

ELEANOR’S CAKES

¼ cup of butter.
½ cup of sugar.
¼ cup of milk.
1 egg.
1 cup of flour.
1 teaspoonful of baking-powder.
½ teaspoonful of vanilla.

Rub the butter and sugar to a cream, beat the egg light without separating, and put it in next; then the milk, a little at a time; mix the baking-powder with the flour and stir in, and last the [146] vanilla. Bake in small scalloped tins, and fill each one only half-full.

GRANDMOTHER’S LITTLE FEATHER CAKE

1 cup sugar.
2 tablespoonfuls soft butter.
1 egg.
½ cup milk and water mixed.
1½ cups sifted flour.
1 teaspoonful baking-powder.

Rub the butter and sugar to a cream. Beat the yolk of the egg stiff and put that in; then add part of the milk and water, and part of the flour and baking-powder, which has been sifted together; next the vanilla, and last the stiff whites of the eggs, not stirred in, but just lightly folded in. If you put them in heavily and roughly, the cake will always be heavy. Bake this in a buttered biscuit-tin, and cut in squares when cold. It is nice covered with caramel or chocolate icing.

[147]

DOMINO CAKE

Make this feather cake and pour it into two pans, so that the bottom shall be just covered, and bake it quickly. When it is done, take it out of the pans and ice it, and while the icing is still a little soft, mark it off into dominoes. When it is entirely cold, cut these out, and with a clean paint-brush paint little round spots on them with a little melted chocolate, to exactly represent the real dominoes. It is fun to play a game with these at a tea-party, and eat them up afterwards.

MARGARET’S OWN CAKE

Margaret’s mother named this cake for her, because she liked so much to make it and to eat it. It is very nice cake for little girls.

5 eggs.
1 cup of granulated sugar. [148]
1 cup of flour.
1 pinch of salt.
½ teaspoonful of lemon juice, or vanilla.

Separate the eggs, and beat the yolks very light and foamy; then put in the sugar, which you have sifted, a little at a time, and the flour in the same way; but put them in in turn—first sugar, then flour, and so on. Then put in the flavouring, and last fold in the whites of the eggs, beaten very stiff. Bake in a buttered pan.

SPONGE CAKE

Take four eggs, their weight in castor sugar, and the weight of two in flour.

Separate the yolks from the whites. Beat the yolks lightly, gradually add sugar, then add the whites, which have been beaten stiffly, and lastly the flour and a few drops of essence of lemon.

Bake in a moderate oven for one hour.

[149]

BRANDY SNAPS

¼ lb. flour.
¼ lb. butter.
½ lb. castor sugar.
3 oz. best treacle.
1 teaspoonful ground ginger.
Little juice of lemon.

The butter and the treacle to be made warm in the oven; then put the sugar and flour, ground ginger and lemon to it, and stir till smooth.

Spread very thin on the baking-sheet. When done, take off in squares; let them get a little cool, and then roll them round the handle of a wooden spoon; don’t let them get too stiff or they will not roll.

LAYER CAKE

1 cup sugar.
½ cup water.
2 eggs.
2 teaspoonfuls baking-powder. [150]
½ cup butter.
2½ cups flour.
Teaspoonful vanilla.

Rub the butter to a cream in a deep bowl, and put in the sugar a little at a time, and rub this till it, too, creams. Then put in the beaten yolks of the eggs, and then the water. Beat the egg-whites well, and fold in half, then add the flour, in which you have mixed and sifted the baking-powder, and then put in the vanilla and the rest of the eggs.

Divide in two layers, or in three if the tins are small, and bake till a light brown.

DANISH CAKES

5 oz. flour.
¼ lb. butter.
2 oz. brown sugar.
A few drops of vanilla.
1 egg.
1 oz. cocoanut.

[151] Rub butter in flour, add sugar and vanilla, mix with yolk of egg, roll out and cut out with round cutter, brush tops over with the white of egg, sprinkle over with cocoanut, and bake in moderate oven about quarter of an hour.

COCOANUT CAKES

¼ lb. cocoanut.
Whites of 2 eggs.
2 oz. castor sugar.

Beat whites to a stiff froth, then add the sugar and cocoanut, drop on a greased tin, and bake in a quick oven.

DUNDEE CAKE

Cream together six ounces of butter and six ounces of castor sugar; well whisk four eggs.

Sieve together eight ounces of flour with half-teaspoonful of baking-powder, add to the flour the grated rind of [152] one lemon. Next add the eggs and flour alternately to the butter and sugar; stir in well; mix together quarter-pound currants, quarter-pound sultanas, three ounces chopped peel, and one ounce shredded almonds. Add these to the other ingredients, mixing well. Put mixture into a lined tin, sprinkle almonds on the top, and bake one and a half hours.

JOU CAKE

6 oz. of butter.
½ lb. of castor sugar.
¾ lb. of flour.
4 eggs.
Cup of milk.
¼ lb. of sultanas.
¼ lb. of glacé cherries, cut in half.
2 oz. of citron.
A little essence of vanilla.
2 teaspoonfuls of baking-powder.

First prepare a deep Yorkshire pudding-tin, [153] grease it well, and line it with white paper, and cut. Make it fit the tin; then grease the inside paper well and dust over with sugar. Put the butter into a deep basin and beat well to a cream, then add the sugar and work that in well, then the eggs, one at a time, and beat thoroughly. Add the fruit and the essence, mix the baking-powder with the flour, and stir in gradually to the other ingredients; lastly, stir in a teacupful of milk and pour into the tin, and bake three-quarters of an hour without opening the oven door if possible. If the oven is very hot, put some paper over the top to prevent it getting too brown. The cake can be cut up into any shapes, as it is two and a half inches high when cut.

A NICE RICH CAKE

¾ lb. butter.
½ lb. Demerara sugar. [154]
½ lb. flour.
6 eggs.
1 lb. currants.
1 lb. sultanas.
½ lb. candied peel.
¼ lb. sweet almonds, blanched and sliced.
½ teaspoonful mixed spice.
¼ pint rum or brandy.

Beat butter to a cream; then add sugar and beat well; next the eggs (which must have been well beaten for twenty minutes), then the fruit, peel, and spice. Add the rum and then the flour. Beat all well together; bake in a lined tin, with buttered paper, in a moderate oven three and half hours.

QUEEN CAKES

The weight of two eggs in flour, sugar, and butter. Beat butter to a cream, add the sugar, and well work that in. [155] Next, add one egg—allow five minutes for each egg—then the other, and lastly the flour, in which has been put half-teaspoonful of baking-powder. Stir lightly, add a few cleaned currants, and half fill the moulds. These must be prepared before you begin the mixture. Bake in a moderate oven a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes; let them stand a few minutes when done, and turn out on a wire sieve. It is sufficient for twelve or fourteen cakes.

SHORTBREAD

½ lb. flour.
5 oz. butter.
3 oz. sugar.

Put in a basin and knead all well together; roll out and cut out with plain or fancy cutters. Bake in a quick oven a quarter of an hour. They must not be baked brown.

[156]

NOAH’S BUN

1 lb. flour.
½ lb. Demerara sugar.
½ lb. sultanas.
¼ lb. currants.
1 teaspoonful ground ginger.
1 teaspoonful mixed spice.
1 dessertspoonful carbonate of soda.
6 oz. butter, warmed in a breakfast-cup of milk.

Stir the butter and milk into the other ingredients with a wooden spoon, and bake in a buttered and lined tin two hours; it is a very dark cake.

A NICE CHOCOLATE CAKE

½ lb. butter.
2 oz. ground rice.
½ lb. grated chocolate.
¼ lb. flour.
6 oz. castor sugar.
1 teaspoonful baking-powder.
4 eggs. [157]
A few drops essence of vanilla.

Beat butter and sugar together for twenty minutes, add the chocolate—previously dissolved in a tablespoonful of milk, not too hot—add yolks one at a time, mixing each carefully. Mix flour, rice, and powder together, and sift through a sieve to the yolks, and stir gently. Beat whites to a stiff broth, stir in lightly, add the essence, and bake in a papered tin in a good oven an hour and half. The oven door must not be opened, at least, for half an hour, and closed gently. Try with an iron skewer at the end of one and a half hours.

SWISS ROLL

3 eggs.
6 oz. of castor sugar.
Grated rind of half a lemon.
4 oz. of flour.
½ teaspoonful of baking-powder.

Put yolks and sugar into a basin, [158] whip together for twenty minutes, mix lemon peel and flour gradually. Whip whites to a stiff froth and mix in lightly. Turn the mixture into a well-greased tin, bake twenty minutes in quick oven. Have ready a sheet of paper, well sprinkled with castor; turn the cake on to this; spread two tablespoonfuls of warm raspberry jam, then roll up as lightly as possible, and put on a sieve to cool.

FILLING FOR LAYER CAKES

NUT AND RAISIN FILLING

Use the recipe for plain icing, and add a half-cup of chopped raisins mixed with a half-cup of chopped almonds or English walnuts.

FIG FILLING

Mix a cup of chopped figs with the same icing.

[159]

ORANGE FILLING

1 cup powdered sugar.
1 tablespoonful boiling water.
Grated rind of 1 orange.
1 tablespoonful orange juice.

Put the sugar in a bowl, add the rind, then the water and juice, and spread at once on the cake. This icing must be very thick when made, and if it seems thin put in more sugar.

CARAMEL FILLING

2 cups brown sugar.
½ cup cream or milk.
Butter the size of an egg.
½ teaspoonful vanilla.

Mix all together and cook till it is smooth and thick.

EASY FRUIT-CAKE

Margaret’s Other Aunt begged to have this in the book, because she said [160] it was so simple any little girl could make it, and all the family could help eat it, as they were especially fond of fruit-cake.

1 cup butter.
2 cups sugar.
1 cup milk.
1 cup currants.
1 cup raisins.
1 egg.
1 teaspoonful soda.
2 teaspoonfuls mixed spices.
3 cups flour.

Wash and dry the currants. Buy the seeded raisins and wash these, too, and then chop them. Cream the butter and sugar, add the egg, beaten well without separating, then the sugar with the soda stirred in it, then the milk, then the spice. Measure the flour, and then take out a half-cup of it, and stir in the raisins and currants, to keep them from going to the bottom [161] of the cake when it is baked. Stir these in, add the rest of the flour and beat well. Bake in two buttered cake-tins.

PLAIN ICING

Put the white of one egg into a bowl with a half-teaspoonful of water, and beat till light. Then stir in a cup of sifted powdered sugar, and put on the cake while that is still warm, and smooth it over with a wet knife.

CHOCOLATE ICING

Melt one square of chocolate in a saucer over the tea-kettle, and put in two tablespoonfuls of milk and stir till smooth. Add two tablespoonfuls of sugar and a small half-teaspoonful of butter, and stir again. Take it off the stove and put it on the cake while both are warm.

[162]

CARAMEL ICING

½ cup milk.
2 cups brown sugar.
Butter the size of an egg.
1 teaspoonful vanilla.

Mix the butter, sugar, and milk, and cook till it is smooth and thick, stirring all the time and watching it carefully to see that it does not burn; take it off and put in the vanilla, and spread while warm on a warm cake.

DOUGHNUTS

Margaret’s mother did not approve of putting this recipe in her cook-book, because she did not want Margaret ever to eat rich things; but her grandmother said it really must go in, for once in a while very nice doughnuts would not hurt anybody.

1½ cups of sugar.
½ cup of butter.
3 eggs. [163]
1½ cups of milk.
2 teaspoonfuls of baking-powder.
Pinch of salt.

Put in flour enough to make a very soft dough, just as soft as you can handle it. Mix, and put on a slightly floured board and make into round balls, or roll out and cut with a cutter with a hole in the centre. Take two cups of lard with one cup of beef suet which you have melted and strained, and heat till it browns a bit of bread instantly. Then drop in three doughnuts—not more, or you will chill the fat—and when you take them out dry on brown paper. It is much better to use part suet than all lard, yet that will do if you have no suet in the house.

TEA CAKES

2 squares of chocolate.
1 teaspoonful of sugar.
Bit of butter the size of a pea.

[164] Melt the chocolate over the fire and stir in the sugar and butter and a couple of drops of vanilla, if you like. Take little round biscuits, and with a fork roll them quickly in this till they are covered; dry on buttered paper.

BREAD SAUCE FOR CHICKEN, TURKEY, AND GAME

Put into a saucepan the quantity of milk you think will be required. Put some stale bread through the wire sieve and put the crumbs into the milk—not a great deal at first, as the bread swells. Also put a small onion, with four cloves stuck in it, into the milk. Let it gently simmer until the bread swells, but if not fairly thick add more crumbs. Before serving take out the onion and add salt and pepper and a lump of butter.

[165]

BROWN SAUCE FOR FISH

One ounce of butter into a stewpan. Stir in a spoonful of flour (or more if a large quantity is required). Let these cook together for five minutes, then add some well-seasoned stock and stir till it boils; colour with some gravy colouring; add salt to taste. Add a glass of port or sherry, one teaspoonful of anchovy sauce, same of Worcester sauce, a little chopped parsley and mushrooms. Just before serving add a little lemon juice—about a teaspoonful; if it is put in at first it will turn the parsley brown.

COLD BRANDY SAUCE FOR PLUM PUDDING

4 oz. of butter.
4 oz. of castor sugar.
4 tablespoonfuls of brandy.

Beat butter to the thickness of honey, mix in the sugar and pour in the brandy by degrees, and see that all is well mixed.

[166]

TARTS

Margaret’s mother did not like her to eat tarts, but she let her learn how to make them, and once in a while she had a small piece. Here is her recipe:

1 lb. of flour.
¼ lb. of butter.
¼ lb. of lard.
1 teaspoonful of salt.
½ cup of water.

Put the flour, butter, lard, and salt in a bowl, and rub well in. Then add the water, a little at a time, turning the paste and mixing till smooth, but not touching with the hand. Put a very little flour on the pastry-board and lift the crust on this, and with a floured rolling-pin lightly roll it out once each way; fold it over and roll again, and do this several times till the crust looks even, with no lumps of butter showing anywhere. Put it on a plate and lay [167] it in the ice-chest for at least an hour before you use it.

Pie-crust will never be light and nice if you handle it. Do not touch it with your fingers unless it is really necessary. When you use it, get everything ready for the pie first, and then bring out the crust, roll quickly, and spread over the pie.

Put a narrow strip of paste all round the edge, and press it together; if you wet it with a little water it will stick.

Put on the cover, wet the edges so they will stick together, and pinch evenly.

APPLE TART

Fill a baking-dish with apples, peeled and cut in slices. Sprinkle cinnamon and plenty of sugar, about half a cup. Put in the oven and bake till the apples are soft, and then cool, put on the crust, and bake till brown. Serve powdered sugar and rich cream with this.

[168]

FRENCH PEACH PIE

Put the crust in the pie-dish as before; boil a cup of sugar with two tablespoonfuls of water till it thickens. Lay quarters of peaches in the paste, round and round, evenly, no one on top of the other. Break ten peach-stones and arrange the kernels evenly on top; then pour the syrup over, and put a few narrow strips of crust across the pie, four each way, and bake.

CRANBERRY PIE

Cook a quart of cranberries till tender, with a small cup of water; when they have simmered till rather thick, put in a heaped cup of sugar and cook five minutes more. When as thick as oatmeal, take them off the fire and put through the colander; line a tin with crust, fill with the berries, put strips of crust across, and bake. A nice plan is [169] to take half a cup of raisins and a cup of cranberries for a pie, chopping together and cooking with water as before, adding a sprinkling of flour and a little vanilla when done.

TARTLETS

Whenever Margaret made a tart she always saved all the bits of crust and rolled them out, and lined patty-pans with them and baked them. She often filled them with raw rice while they baked, to keep them in shape, saving the rice when they were done. She filled the shells with jelly, and used the tartlets for lunch.

CANDY

Margaret did not wait till she reached the recipes for candy at the back of her book before she began to make it. She [170] made it all the way along, whenever another little girl came to spend the afternoon, or it was such a rainy day that she could not go out. Nearly always she made sugar candy, because it was such fun to pull it, and she used the same recipe her mother used when she was a little girl.

SUGAR CANDY

2 cups brown sugar.
1 cup white sugar.
1 tablespoonful butter.
1 tablespoonful vinegar.
1 small teaspoonful soda.

Boil hard twenty minutes, stirring all the time, and cool in shallow pans. If you double the quantity you must boil the candy five minutes longer.

The best thing about this candy is that it does not stick to the fingers, if you let it get quite cool before touching [171] it, and pull it in small quantities. Do not put any butter on your fingers, but work fast.

HARDBAKE

Make the sugar candy given above, and stir in a large cup of shelled almonds just before taking it from the fire. Put in shallow, buttered pans.

PEPPERMINT DROPS

1 cup of sugar.
2 tablespoonfuls of water.
3 teaspoonfuls of peppermint essence.

Boil the sugar and water till when you drop a little in water it will make a firm ball in your fingers. Then take it off the fire and stir in the peppermint, and carefully drop four drops, one exactly on top of another, on a buttered platter. Do not put these too near together.

[172]

CREAM WALNUTS

2 cups of light brown sugar.
⅔ cup of boiling water.
1 small saltspoonful of cream of tartar.
1 cup of chopped walnuts.

Boil till the syrup makes a thread, then cool till it begins to thicken, and stir in the walnuts and drop on buttered paper.

CREAM MADE FROM ICING SUGAR

Take the white of one egg, and measure just as much cold water; mix the two well, and stir stiff with icing sugar; add a little flavouring, vanilla, or almond, or pistache, and, for some candies, colour with a tiny speck of fruit paste. This is the beginning of all sorts of cream candy.

CHOCOLATE CREAMS

Make the cream candy into balls, melt three squares of chocolate; put a [173] ball on a little skewer or a fork, and dip into the chocolate and lay on buttered paper.

NUT CANDY

Chop a cup of almonds and mix with the cream candy; make into bars, and when cold cut in slices.

WALNUT CREAMS

Press two walnut halves on small balls of cream candy, one on either side.

BUTTERSCOTCH

6 tablespoonfuls of brown sugar.
2 tablespoonfuls of water.
1 tablespoonful of butter.
1 saltspoonful of soda.

Boil all together, without stirring, till it hardens in water; then put in a small [174] teaspoonful of vanilla and pour at once on a buttered dish. When hard break up into squares.

PINOCHE

1 cup light brown sugar.
1 cup cream.
1 cup walnuts, chopped fine.
Butter the size of a walnut.
1 teaspoonful vanilla.

Cook the sugar and cream till it makes a ball in water; then put in the butter, vanilla, and nuts, and beat till creamy and spread on a dish.

BETTY’S ORANGE CANDY

Betty was Margaret’s particular friend, so this was her favourite recipe:

2 cups sugar.
Juice of one orange.

[175] Boil till it hardens in water, and then pull it.

CREAMED DATES, FIGS, AND CHERRIES

Make the plain cream candy, as before; wash the dates well, open at one side, and take out the stones and press in a ball of the candy; leave the side open. You can sprinkle with granulated sugar if you choose.

Cut figs in small pieces, and roll each piece in the cream candy till it is hidden.

For the cherries, colour the cream candy light pink and make into little balls. On top of each press a candied cherry.

DATES WITH NUTS

Wash and wipe the dates dry, and take out the stones. Put half an English walnut in each and press the edges together; roll in granulated sugar. Small figs may be prepared in the same way.

[176]

MARGARET’S SCHOOL LUNCHEONS

As Margaret had to take her luncheon to school with her sometimes, she had to learn how to make a good many kinds of sandwiches, because she soon grew tired of one or two sorts.

Cut the bread very thin and spread lightly with butter, and after they are done trim off the crusts neatly, not taking off all the crust, but making the two pieces even. For plain meat sandwiches, chop the meat very fine, sprinkle with salt, and spread on the bread; if it is too dry, put in a very little cream as you chop the meat.

EGG SANDWICHES

Make a very little French dressing—about a teaspoonful of oil, a sprinkling of salt, and four drops of lemon juice [177] or vinegar. Chop a hard-boiled egg very fine, mix with the dressing, and spread.

LETTUCE SANDWICHES

Spread the bread, lay on a lettuce-leaf, and cover with French dressing, or with mayonnaise. These sandwiches are about the best for school, as they do not get dry.

CELERY SANDWICHES

Chop the celery fine, mix with a French or mayonnaise dressing, and spread.

CHICKEN AND CELERY SANDWICHES

Mix chopped celery and chopped chicken, as much of one as the other, wet with French or mayonnaise dressing, and spread.

[178]

SARDINE SANDWICHES

Scrape off all the skin from the sardines, and take out the bones and drain them by laying them on paper; mash them with a fork, and sprinkle with lemon juice, and spread.

TOMATO AND CHEESE SANDWICHES

Slice a small, firm tomato very thin indeed, and take out all the seeds and soft pulp, leaving only the firm part; put one slice on the bread, and one thin shaving of cheese over it, and then put on bread. A slice of tomato with a spreading of mayonnaise makes a nice sandwich.

THE END

Printed by Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury.